All the Class and Artifact Trait Changes in Patch 7.2.5

Patch 7.2.5 has more class changes than Patch 7.2, so we've started up our usual compilation of overall class changes from the PTR - talents, abilities, set bonuses, artifact traits. Every week Wowhead posts a list of the datamined changes from each 7.2.5 PTR update, but some players would also like to see the changes from the past few months to get an overall sense of how the classes evolve, as well as blue posts in one place.

We've gone through the spell data from every update and organized all the changes by spec, noting overall changes to a spell if it was modified several weeks in a row. Not interested in a particular class? Just click the toggle button to hide that class and jump to the next section.

Icebound Fortitude Your blood freezes, granting immunity to Stun effects and reducing all damage you take by 20% for 8 sec.Now requires Level 57, down from 65Vampiric Blood Embrace your undeath, increasing your maximum health by 30% and increasing all healing and absorbs received by 30% for 10 sec.Now requires Level 60, up from 57Death and DecayBlood:Corrupts the targeted ground, causing 27%28.62% of Attack power) * 11] Shadow damage over 10 sec to targets within the area. While you remain within the area, your Heart Strike will hit up to 3 additional targets.Scourge Strike will hit all enemies near the target.

Icebound Fortitude Your blood freezes, granting immunity to Stun effects and reducing all damage you take by 20% for 8 sec.Now requires Level 57, down from 65Rime Your Obliterate has a 45% chance and Frostscythe has a 22.5% chance to cause your next Howling Blast to consume no runes and deal 300% additional damage.

Unholy:Corrupts the targeted ground, causing 27%28.62% of Attack power) * 11] Shadow damage over 10 sec to targets within the area. While you remain within the area, your Scourge Strike will hit all enemies near the target.

Festering Strike Deals 475%503% Physical damage and infects the target with 2 to 4 Festering Wounds. Festering WoundA pustulent lesion that will burst on death or when damaged by Scourge Strike, dealing (100%106% of Attack power) Shadow damage and generating 3 Runic Power.

Festering Wound A pustulent lesion that will burst on death or when damaged by Scourge Strike, dealing (100%106% of Attack power) Shadow damage and generating 3 Runic Power.

Outbreak Deals (38% of Attack power) Shadow damage and surrounds the target in a miasma lasting for 6 sec that causes the target and all nearby enemies to be infected with Virulent Plague. Virulent PlagueA disease that deals 70%74.2% of Attack power)] Shadow damage over 21 sec. It erupts when the infected target dies, dealing (100%106% of Attack power) Shadow damage divided among nearby enemies, and has a 30% chance to erupt each time it deals damage.

Dark Arbiter Summon a Val'kyr to attack the target for 1520 sec. The Val'kyr will gain 1% increased damage for every 1 Runic Power you spend.

Defile Defile the targeted ground, dealing 48%70% of Attack power) * (11) / 1)] Shadowfrost damage to all enemies over 10 sec.Every 1 sec, if any enemies are standing in the Defile, it grows in size and increases your Mastery by 1, stacking up to 10 times.While you remain within your Defile, your Clawing Shadows / Scourge Strike will hit all enemies near the target.

Epidemic Causes each of your Virulent Plagues within 100 yds to flare up, dealing (150%159% of Attack power) Shadow damage to the infected enemy, and an additional (27.5% of Attack power) Shadow damage to all other enemies near them.

Shadow Infusion While your Sludge Belcher / abomination ghoul is not transformed, Death Coil will also reduce the remaining cooldown of Dark Transformation by 5 sec.7 sec.

Soul Reaper Strike an enemy's soul for 350%371% Shadow damage, afflicting them with Soul Reaper for 5 sec.Bursting a Festering Wound on an enemy afflicted by Soul Reaper grants 7% Haste for 15 sec, stacking up to 3 times.

Crypt Fever Whenever enemies are healed while afflicitedEnemies healed while afflicted by your Festering Wound, they take (85%Wounds have a chance to take (200% of Attack power) Shadow damage.

Necrotic Strike A vicious strike that deals 100% Plague damage, and converts 1 Festering Wound into a Necrotic Wound, absorbing the next (600900 / 100 * Attack power) healing received by the target.

Blizzard Posts

Blizzard

We are increasing the cost and damage of Death Coil in 7.2.5. Even with no other changes, that change is likely a pure buff (even though it looks neutral), since the resource it's draining is one that was being wasted anyway.

It's not yet clear whether we'll open up further changes in 7.2.5, since the core rotation is generally working well. Having 3 main buttons (Festering Wound, Scourge Strike, Death Coil) that all have no cooldowns, but instead juggle 3 resources (Runes, Runic Power, Festering Wounds), is a relatively unusual melee rotation that we think has turned out pretty interesting. The biggest thing it needs is space to breathe on the resources, as has been discussed a lot. We'll see how it looks with the Death Coil change in addition to the earlier Runic Corruption change, as well as the loss of T19 set bonuses, and see if there's still a problem.

If we need to make further changes, the goal would likely be to focus on talents that cause a very large swing in resource generation or GCD usage. Because the rotation needs to not be flooded for max-level players with endgame bonuses, but also not too slow for leveling players, as was pointed out. This is an issue we're starting to pay more attention to across all specs (especially melee specs). As we have more rotation-affecting talents in the game than ever before, and we buffed a lot of of them in 7.1.5, many talents (or legendaries or similar bonuses) are trying to effect large DPS increases solely through giving more of a resource or proc. It's becoming a more common problem that specs which initially had good pacing get flooded in certain setups, and we want to start correcting those where we can.

Crypt Fever is changing to have a high chance on each healing event to deal more damage than it does currently on live. This change is to smooth out the Honor Talent's power based on the type of healer you are facing, while still keeping an emphasis that this is powerful against heal over time effects. We'll be tuning the proc rate and internal cooldown to make sure we're hitting the numbers we want against each type of healer.Fix Necrotic Strike!

Infernal Strike Leap through the air toward a targeted location, dealing (252%316% of Attack power) Fire damage to all enemies within 6 yards.

Shear Shears an enemy for 270%340% Physical damage, and has a small chance to shatter a Lesser Soul Fragment from your target that heals you for (250% of Attack power) health when consumed.Generates 10 Pain.

Sigil of Flame Place a Sigil of Flame at the target location that activates after 2 sec.Deals (148.5%186% of Attack power) Fire damage, and an additional (162%204% of Attack power) Fire damage over 6 sec, to all enemies affected by the sigil.

Soul Cleave Viciously strike all enemies in front of you for up to (2 * 270%340%) Physical damage and heal yourself for up to 5.5 * (1 + Versatility) 7.26 * 1000 / 1000], based on Pain spent.Consumes all Soul Fragments within 25 yds.

Demonic Infusion Draw from the power of the Twisting Nether to instantly activate and then refill your charges of Demon Spikes.Generates 60 Pain.Cooldown changed from 2 min cooldown to 1.5 min cooldown

Consume all Soul Fragments within 25 yds and then explode, afflicting nearby enemies with Frailty for 20 sec and damaging them for (252%300% of Attack power) Fire per fragment.You heal for 20% of all damage you deal to enemies with Frailty.Tier 6 Talent, in place of Spirit Bomb

SolitudeHavoc:Increases your damage by 15%Fury generation by 20% and attack speed by 15% when there are no allies within 15 yards.Vengeance:Increases your damage by 15%Pain generation by 20% and attack speed by 15% when there are no allies within 15 yards.

Ironfur Increases armor by 80%65% for 6 sec. Multiple uses of this ability may overlap.

Talents

Guardian of Elune Mangle increases the duration of your next Ironfur or Mark of Ursol by 2 sec, or the healing of your next Frenzied Regeneration by 20%.

Galactic Guardian Your damage has a 10%7% chance to trigger a free automatic Moonfire on that target. When this occurs, the next Moonfire you cast generates 8 Rage, and deals 300% increased direct damage.

Honor Talents

Overrun Charge to an enemy, stunning them for 3 sec and knocking back their allies within 15 yards.Range changed from Unlimited range to 8 - 25 yd range

Sharpened Claws Increases the damage done by your Swipe and Thrash by 50%25%.

Artifact Traits (3)

Gory Fur Mangle has a 15% chance to reduce the Rage cost of your next Ironfur or Mark of Ursol by 25%.

Mauler Increases the critical strike chance of Maul by 3%5%.Rank 2: Increases the critical strike chance of Maul by 6%10%.Rank 3: Increases the critical strike chance of Maul by 9%15%.Rank 4: Increases the critical strike chance of Maul by 12%20%.Rank 5: Increases the critical strike chance of Maul by 15%25%.Rank 6: Increases the critical strike chance of Maul by 18%30%.Rank 7: Increases the critical strike chance of Maul by 21%35%.Rank 8: Increases the critical strike chance of Maul by 24%40%.

Ursoc's Endurance Increases the duration of Barkskin Ironfur, and Mark of Ursoland Ironfur by 0.5 sec.

Blizzard Posts

Blizzard

In my earlier post on this thread, I mentioned we were already considering what the right changes to Guardian would be going into Tomb, but that it was likely going to be for 7.2.5 and not 7.2. In the first 7.2.5 PTR, you can expect to see the following changes to Guardian:

--Mark of Ursol removed--Maul costs 30 Rage (from 20), is now on the GCD, can now proc Gore, and damage increased by 400%.

I imagine the first change is most pertinent to those focused on the broader issue of tank balance. It may seem rather extreme, and that's part of why doing it mid-tier wasn't the plan we went with. But two factors that were important were 1) Mark of Ursol's design (trade your physical AM for a magical AM) was somewhat incompatible with any use of magic damage other than an occasional threatening spike, and 2) Druids had little in the way of identifiable weaknesses or things that potentially scare them. Even without Mark of Ursol, they have a mastery that's fully effective against magic, multiple medium to long cooldowns, Frenzied Regeneration, and some passives like Adaptive Fur. While we'll be continuing to watch this in 7.2.5 development, our expectation is that they will not struggle to complete content that involves magic damage--which the clearest test of why a button that allows them to mitigate it so much further is not needed at all.

Starfall Calls down waves of falling stars at the targeted area, dealing 44%45.76% of Spell power)] Astral damage over 8 sec. Balance (Level 65)Also applies Stellar Empowerment to each target, which increases periodic damage taken from your Moonfire and Sunfire by 20%

Starfall Starfall applies Stellar Empowerment to each target, which increases periodic damage taken from your Moonfire and Sunfire by 20%.

Starsurge Launch a surge of stellar energies at the target, dealing (450%520% of Spell power) Astral damage.Also grants you Lunar and Solar Empowerments, which increase the damage of your next Lunar Strike and Solar Wrath by 20%, respectively. Balance (Level 70)You can accumulate up to 1 of each Empowerment

Effect #1 School Damage Value: 1 (SP mod: 4.55.2)

SunfireRestoration:A quick beam of solar light burns the enemy for (110%114.4% of Spell power) Nature damage and then an additional (330%343.2% of Spell power) Nature damage over 12 sec to the primary target and all enemies within 5 yardsBalance:A quick beam of solar light burns the enemy for (110%114.4% of Spell power) Nature damage and then an additional (330%343.2% of Spell power) Nature damage over 12 sec to the primary target and all enemies within 5 yardsGenerates 0 Astral Power.

Talents

Incarnation: Chosen of Elune An improved Moonkin Form that increases the damage of all your spells by 35% and causes your Lunar Strike and Solar Wrath to generate 35%50% additional Astral Power.Lasts 30 sec. You may shapeshift in and out of this improved Moonkin Form for its duration.

Fury of Elune Calls down a beam of pure celestial energy at the target location, dealing 170%176.8% of Spell power)] Astral damage every 1 sec until your Astral Power is exhausted.While Fury of Elune is active, you may recast it for no cost to direct the beam to move to a new location.

Shooting Stars Moonfire and Sunfire damage over time has a 10% chance to call down a falling star, dealing (55%57.2% of Spell power) Astral damage and generating 4 Astral Power.

Stellar Drift Increases Starfall's radius by 30%, Starfall damage by 60%50%, and allows you to cast while moving while within Starfall's radius.

SunfireRestoration:A quick beam of solar light burns the enemy for (110%114.4% of Spell power) Nature damage and then an additional (330%343.2% of Spell power) Nature damage over 12 sec to the primary target and all enemies within 5 yardsBalance:A quick beam of solar light burns the enemy for (110%114.4% of Spell power) Nature damage and then an additional (330%343.2% of Spell power) Nature damage over 12 sec to the primary target and all enemies within 5 yardsGenerates 0 Astral Power.

Talents

Cultivation When Rejuvenation heals a target below 60% health, it applies Cultivation to the target, healing them for (144%120% of Spell power) over 6 sec.

Honor Talents

NEW Ironbark now also grants the target Nature's Grasp, rooting the first 2 attackers for 8 sec.New level 8 Honor Talent

Fortified Bark Reduces the cooldown of your Ironbark by an additional 15 sec, and increases the damage reduction effect by an additional 15%.Removed

Focused Growth Reduces the mana cost of your Lifebloom by 50%60%, and your Lifebloom also applies Focused Growth to the target, increasing Lifebloom's healing by 20%50%. Stacks up to 3 times.

Nourish Reduces the cast time of Healing Touch by 0.2 sec and Your Healing Touch automatically applies one of your missing healing over time spells to the target. If all of them are present, Healing Touch critically heals.

Overgrowth Instantly applies Regrowth, Lifebloom, Rejuvenation and Wild Growth Lifebloom, Rejuvenation, Wild Growth, and Regrowth's heal over time effect to the target.Cost changed from 30.0% of base mana to 40.0% of base mana

Revitalize When targets with your Rejuvenation are hit by a melee critical attack, they will be healedCasting Rejuvenation grants the target 2 charges of Revitalize.Revitalize will heal the target for (200% of Spell power) andafter taking a melee critical strike, and increase the duration of your Rejuvenation will be refreshed.Rejuvenation by 3 sec.

Bestial Wrath Sends you and your pet into a rage, increasing all damage you both deal by 25% for 10 sec. 15 sec. Beast Mastery (Level 54)Bestial Wrath's remaining cooldown is reduced by 1512 sec each time you use Dire FrenzyBestial Wrath's remaining cooldown is reduced by 1512 sec each time you use Dire Beast

Chimaera Shot A two-headed shot that hits your primary target and another nearby target, dealing 600%720% Nature damage to one and 600%720% Frost damage to the other. Generatesother.Generates 10 Focus for each target hit.Cooldown changed from 9 sec cooldown to 15 sec cooldown

Honor Talents

Dire Beast: Basilisk Summons a slow moving basilisk near the target for 30 sec that attacks the target for heavy damage.Now requires Level 28, down from 46Row 6 Col 2 PvP Talent, in place of Dire Beast: Hawk

Dire Beast: Hawk Summons a hawk to circle the target area, attacking all targets within 10 yards over the next 10 sec.Now requires Level 10, down from 28Row 6 Col 1 PvP Talent, in place of Go for the Throat

Go for the Throat When you Kill Command a target at 30% health or lower, the cooldown is reset.Removed

NEW The next hostile spell cast on the target will cause hostile spells for the next 3 sec. to be redirected to your pet.Your pet must be within 10 yards of the target for spells to be redirected.New Level 46 PvP Talent, in place of Dire Beast: Basilisk

When your pet attacks a target alone without your assisting for 5 sec, it becomes enraged increasing its damage by 15%. Attacking your pet's target calms it down, removing the enrage effect. When your pet is further than 25 yards away from you, it gains up to 50% additional movement speed and 25% damage reduction. Effect increased when your pet is further away from you.

The Beast Within Reduces the cooldown of Bestial Wrath by 1510 sec, and you become immune to all Fear and Horror effects while Bestial Wrath is active.

Thunderslash While Aspect of the Wild is active, Hati and your primary pet also trigger a Thunderslash with each auto attack, dealing (100%50% of Attack power * 1.0176]) Nature damage.

Jaws of Thunder Kill Command has a 10%8% chance to deal an additional 50% of its damage as Nature damage.Rank 2: Kill Command has a 20%16% chance to deal an additional 50% of its damage as Nature damage.Rank 3: Kill Command has a 30%24% chance to deal an additional 50% of its damage as Nature damage.Rank 4: Kill Command has a 40%32% chance to deal an additional 50% of its damage as Nature damage.Rank 5: Kill Command has a 50%40% chance to deal an additional 50% of its damage as Nature damage.Rank 6: Kill Command has a 60%48% chance to deal an additional 50% of its damage as Nature damage.Rank 7: Kill Command has a 70%56% chance to deal an additional 50% of its damage as Nature damage.Rank 8: Kill Command has a 80%64% chance to deal an additional 50% of its damage as Nature damage.

Blizzard PostsNote: the following mechanic was discussed but later scrapped in favor of the later blue post.

Blizzard

In 7.2.5, we are changing Wild Call from a cooldown reset mechanic to a cooldown reduction mechanic.

The base proc chance will be doubled and the cooldown reduction per proc will be 3.0 sec (affected by haste), roughly half the average expected value of current live Wild Call procs. Baseline, the amount of total Dire Beast casts and Dire Beast uptime should be roughly the same as on live, except the changes should result in smoother Focus regeneration from more well-paced Dire Beast casts.

Additionally, these changes have the desired side effect of bringing the power level of The Mantle of Command more in line with other legendaries.

Overall, this will result in more Focus for all Beast Mastery Hunters, resulting in a more active rotation. Additionally, this gives all Beast Mastery Hunters access to a Dire Beast/Dire Frenzy with 2 charges playstyle that is more engaging and fun, allowing you to make decisions on when to use the buttons, instead of feeling like you should most often simply push them on cooldown.

We’ve been trying other iterations of changes surrounding Dire Beast/Dire Frenzy and Wild Call, including increasing Dire Beast/Dire Frenzy Focus generation or versions that avoided changing the legendary shoulders drastically, but ultimately reached the conclusion that giving 2 charges to the abilities baseline, which many of you have asked for, was the best change for the spec at the current time. We appreciate your patience while we try different iterations on PTR.

We are also making a few other less major changes to the spec in the next PTR patch, including:

Aspect of the Wild will reduce the global cooldowns of your damaging abilities by 0.2 seconds, allowing you to more reliably spend the Focus you’re generating while it's active, especially with Dire Beast/Dire Frenzy going off.

Kill Command and Dire Frenzy will cause your pet/Hati to charge up to 40 yds (up from 25 yds) to the target, matching the max range of your ranged abilities.

When your pet casts Dash, Hati will also gain Dash for the same duration.

Dire Frenzy is bugged right now on PTR.

The DIre Frenzy change should read as "Instead of generating 25 Focus instantly, generates 24 Focus over 8 secs, similar to how Dire Beast generates Focus." This is to address issues with using Dire Frenzy while near full Focus, especially combined with Dire Stable.

Also currently the Dire Frenzy Focus regen buff is overwriting itself rather than stacking independently like Dire Beast's Focus regen buff.

Rapidly fires shots at all targets with your Hunter's Mark, dealing 550% Physical damage and making them Vulnerable for 7 sec. VulnerableDamage taken from Aimed ShotPiercing Shotand Piercing Shot increased by 100%30% for 7 sec.

Talents

Patient Sniper Gain the patience of a veteran sniper, increasing the damage bonus of Vulnerable by 10%6% every 1 sec.

Piercing Shot A powerful shot which deals up to (2 * 500%775%) Physical damage to the target and up to 500%775% Physical damage to all enemies between you and the target. Damage increased against targets with Vulnerable.

Sidewinders Launches Sidewinders that travel toward the target, weaving back and forth and dealing (400%500% of Attack power) Nature damage to each target they hit. Cannot hit the same target twice. Applies Vulnerable to all targets hit.Generates 35 Focus.Also replaces Multi-Shot.

Artifact Traits

Unerring Arrows Increases the effectiveness of Vulnerability by 10%3%.Rank 2: Increases the effectiveness of Vulnerability by 20%6%.Rank 3: Increases the effectiveness of Vulnerability by 30%9%.Rank 4: Increases the effectiveness of Vulnerability by 40%12%.Rank 5: Increases the effectiveness of Vulnerability by 50%15%.Rank 6: Increases the effectiveness of Vulnerability by 60%18%.Rank 7: Increases the effectiveness of Vulnerability by 70%21%.Rank 8: Increases the effectiveness of Vulnerability by 80%24%.

NEW Your Aimed Shots that strike Vulnerable targets reduce the remaining cooldown of Aspect of the Cheetah, Aspect of the Turtle, and Exhilaration by 5 sec.Replaces Spray and Pray as Level 28 Honor Talent

Scatter Shot A short-range shot that deals 35% weapon damage, removes all harmful damage over time effects, and incapacitating the target for 4 sec. Any damage caused will remove the effect. Turns off your attack when used.Cooldown changed from 20 sec cooldown to 30 sec cooldown

Sniper Shot Take a sniper's stance, firing a well-aimed shot dealing 850% Physical damage.700% Physical damage.Increases the range of all shots by 40% for 10 sec.

Spray and Pray SidewindersReduces the cooldown of Sidewinders by 30%Dealing damage with Bursting Shot now grants Bombardment.Bombardment now also reduces the global cooldown of Multi-Shot by 0.5 sec.Removed

T.N.T. Reduces the cooldownIncreases the range of Bursting Shot by 10)) sec.30%, and applies Concussive Shot to all targets hit by Bursting Shot.

Trueshot Mastery Reduces the cooldown of Trueshot by 3020 sec, and Trueshot also restores 100% Focus.

Specialization

Explosive Trap Hurls a fire trap to the target location that explodes when an enemy approaches, causing (350% of Attack power) Fire damage and burning all enemies within 58 yards for (350% of Attack power) additional Fire damage over 10 sec. Trap will exist for 1 min.

Talents

Dragonsfire Grenade Hurls a dragonsfire grenade at the target that explodes into flames, inflicting 980%1304% of Attack power) + (300%400% of Attack power)] Fire damage over 8 sec and reducing movement speed by 20%. The volatile flames on the target also scorch nearby enemies.

Artifact Traits

Echoes of Ohn'ara Flanking Strike has a 10%20% chance to summon the spirit of Ohn'ara to smite your foe for (1000% of Attack power) Nature damage.

Arcane Explosion Causes an explosion of magic around the caster, dealing (75%90.75% of Spell power) Arcane damage to all enemies within 10 yards.Damage increased by 60% per Arcane Charge.Mana cost increased by 125% per Arcane Charge.Generates 1 Arcane Charge if any targets are hit.

Arcane Orb Launches an Arcane Orb forward from your position, traveling up to 40 yards, dealing (500%605% of Spell power) Arcane damage to enemies it passes through.Grants 1 Arcane Charge when cast and every time it deals damage.

Erosion Your attacks erode the target's resistances, increasing all damage the target takes from your Arcane spells by 1%, stacking up to 8 times. After 3 sec of not taking damage from your spells, this effect decreases by 1% every 1 sec.

Nether Tempest Places a Nether Tempest on the target which deals (56.4%68.244% of Spell power) Arcane damage over 12 sec to the target and 4.7%5.687% of Spell power) * 12 / 1] to all enemies within 10 yards. Limit 1 target.Damage increased by 60% per Arcane Charge.

Warmth of the Phoenix Phoenix's Flames has a 50% chance to grant 800 Critical Strike to you and 4 allies for 1012 sec.

Honor Talents

Flamecannon After standing still in combat for 2 sec, your maximum health increases by 3%, damage done increases by 3%, and spell range increasesrange of your Fire spells increase by 3 yards.This effect stacks up to 5 times and lasts for 5 sec.

Cone of Cold Targets in a cone in front of you take (57%180% of Spell power) Frost damage and have movement slowed by 70% for 5 sec.

FlurryUnleash a flurry of ice, striking the target 3 times for a total of 152.3%178.191% of Spell power) * 3] Frost damage. Each hit reduces the target's movement speed by 70% for 1 sec. While Brain Freeze is active, Flurry also applies Winter's Chill to the target.

Frostbolt Launches a bolt of frost at the enemy, causing (175%204.75% of Spell power) Frost damage and slowing movement speed by 50% for 15 sec.

Frozen Orb Launches an orb of swirling ice up to 40 yards forward which deals up to 26.3%30.771% of Spell power)] Frost damage to all enemies it passes through. Grants 1 charge of Fingers of Frost when it first damages an enemy.Enemies damaged by the Frost Orb are slowed by 50% for 15 sec.

Comet Storm Calls down a series of 7 icy comets on and around the target, each of which deals (130%152.1% of Spell power) Frost damage to all enemies within 4 yards6 yards of its impact.

Frost Bomb Places a Frost Bomb on the target for 12 sec. Limit 1 target. Your Ice Lances that benefit from Shatter will trigger the release of a wave of freezing ice, dealing (157.5%184.275% of Spell power) Frost damage to the target and (98.4%115.128% of Spell power) Frost damage to all other enemies within 10 yards.

Glacial Spike Conjures a massive spike of ice, and merges your current Icicles into it. It impales your target, dealing (1000%1170% of Spell power) damage plus the damage stored in your Icicles, and freezes the target in place for 4 sec. Damage may interrupt the freeze effect.Requires 5 Icicles to cast.Passive:Ice Lance no longer launches Icicles.

Ice Nova Causes a whirl of icy wind around the target enemy or ally, dealing (450%526.5% of Spell power) Frost damage to all enemies within 8 yards, and freezing them in place for 2 sec. A primary enemy target will take 100% increased damage.Effect #2 School Damage Value: 1 (SP mod: 4.55.265)

Ray of Frost For the next 10 sec, you can channel a beam of icy power at an enemy, slowing movement by 50% and dealing (230%269.1% of Spell power) Frost damage every 1 sec. Each time Ray of Frost deals damage, its damage increases by 20%.

Breath of Fire Breathe fire on targets in front of you, causing (180% of Attack power) Fire damage. Targetsdamage Brewmaster (Level 78)and generating a stack of Elusive Brawler for each targetTargets affected by Keg Smash will also burn for (97.2% of Attack power) Fire damage over 8 sec.

NEW Your Armor is increased by 25%.

Fortifying Brew Turns your skin to stone for 15 sec, increasing your current and maximum health by 20%, increasing the damage you delay with Stagger by an additional 20%10%, and reducing all damage you take by 20%.

Ironskin Brew Increases the damage you delay with Stagger by an additional 40%35% for 6 sec. Shares charges with Purifying Brew.

Keg Smash Smash a keg of brew on the target, dealing (670% of Attack power) damage to all enemies within 8 yds and reducing their movement speed by 50% for 15 sec.Reduces the remaining cooldown on your Brews by 4 sec.Charges changed from None to 1 ChargesPurifying Brew Clears 50%40% of your damage delayed with Stagger.Shares charges with Ironskin Brew.

Mastery: Elusive Brawler Each time you are hit by a melee attack, or hit with Blackout Strike or Breath of Fire, you gain stacking 8% increased Dodge chance until your next successful Dodge.Also increases your attack power by 8%.

Elusive Dance Purifying Brew now clears an additional 15%20% of damage delayed with Stagger.It also grants up to 20% Dodge and damage done for 6 sec, based on the level of Stagger damage purified.

Special Delivery Drinking Ironskin or Purifying Brew has a 30%100% chance to toss a keg high into the air that lands nearby after 3 sec, dealing (810%243% of Attack power) damage to all enemies within 8 yards and reducing their movement speed by 50% for 15 sec.

Artifact Traits

Staggering Around Fortifying Brew increases the damage you delay with Stagger by an additional 2%.Purifying Brew clears an additional 1% of the damage delayed by Stagger.Rank 2: Fortifying Brew increases the damage you delay with Stagger by an additional 4%.Purifying Brew clears an additional 2% of the damage delayed by Stagger.Rank 3: Fortifying Brew increases the damage you delay with Stagger by an additional 6%.Purifying Brew clears an additional 3% of the damage delayed by Stagger.Rank 4: Fortifying Brew increases the damage you delay with Stagger by an additional 8%.Purifying Brew clears an additional 4% of the damage delayed by Stagger.Rank 5: Fortifying Brew increases the damage you delay with Stagger by an additional 10%.Purifying Brew clears an additional 5% of the damage delayed by Stagger.Rank 6: Fortifying Brew increases the damage you delay with Stagger by an additional 12%.Purifying Brew clears an additional 6% of the damage delayed by Stagger.Rank 7: Fortifying Brew increases the damage you delay with Stagger by an additional 14%.Purifying Brew clears an additional 7% of the damage delayed by Stagger.Rank 8: Fortifying Brew increases the damage you delay with Stagger by an additional 16%.Purifying Brew clears an additional 8% of the damage delayed by Stagger.

Dragonfire Brew After using Breath of Fire, you breathe fire 2 additional times, each dealing (63% of Attack power) Fire damage.Increases the duration of Breath of Fire by 100%.

Hot Blooded Increases the damage of Breath of Fire's periodic burning effect by 150%, and causes it to also reduce the target's damage done to you by 12% (6% with Spitfire).6%.

Hot Blooded Increases the damage of Breath of Fire's periodic burning effect by 50%, and causes it to also reduce the target's damage done to you by 4% (2% with Spitfire).2%.

Hot Blooded Increases the damage of Breath of Fire's periodic burning effect by 75%, and causes it to also reduce the target's damage done to you by 6% (3% with Spitfire).3%.

Hot Blooded Increases the damage of Breath of Fire's periodic burning effect by 100%, and causes it to also reduce the target's damage done to you by 8% (4% with Spitfire).4%.

Hot Blooded Increases the damage of Breath of Fire's periodic burning effect by 200%, and causes it to also reduce the target's damage done to you by 16% (8% with Spitfire).8%.

Hot Blooded Increases the damage of Breath of Fire's periodic burning effect by 25%, and causes it to also reduce the target's damage done to you by 2% (1% with Spitfire).1%.

Hot Blooded Increases the damage of Breath of Fire's periodic burning effect by 125%, and causes it to also reduce the target's damage done to you by 10% (5% with Spitfire).5%.

Hot Blooded Increases the damage of Breath of Fire's periodic burning effect by 175%, and causes it to also reduce the target's damage done to you by 14% (7% with Spitfire).7%.

Blizzard

Hail! First round of Brews is on me, Monks. Shall we talk a bit about Brewmasters?

As Seph talked about in a recent Rogue thread, 7.2.5 will include much more significant class change than 7.2 did, and one of the specs that we're focusing on is Brewmaster. Brewmasters are currently quite strong, performance-wise, but have a few notable issues that we'd like to work out.

Offensive AbilitiesRotationally, Brewmasters are using a mixture of offensive and defensive buttons. Some parts of this worked well, such as Keg Smash and Tiger Palm granting partial charges of your Brews. One part that hasn't worked out well is in Blackout Strike and Breath of Fire. Having no direct defensive value, or interaction with other abilities in your rotation, they end up feeling disconnected, and leave you wondering why you're hitting them. There are a couple minor artifact traits that give them some defensive value, but that's ultimately negligible as far as rotation design goes. One saving grace here is the Blackout Combo talent, which gives a strong reason to care about Blackout Strike, and add a lot of depth (and complexity) to your rotation.

Another problem is that Blackout Strike has a 3.0s/Haste cooldown, which is actually rather bizarre on a class with a 1.0s GCDs. Experienced players have learned that you should get a significant enough amount of Haste to bring that down to something in the 2.2-2.5sec range, and alternate Blackout Strikes with other abilities, with awkward 0.2-0.5sec gaps in between your abilities. This also means that with the forced gaps, you become GCD-capped, and Energy stops functioning. Finally, one last problem we're looking at is that there are rather limited options for customizing the rotation through talents (pretty much just Blackout Combo), and no baseline variability, leading to some people finding it repetitive and predictable.

We'd like to clean this up, and here are our current thoughts on how (not set in stone, very interested in discussion and PTR testing).

First, Blackout Strike and Breath of Fire will have a direct defensive value: they'll grant a stack of Mastery: Elusive Brawler (per target hit, in Breath of Fire's case).Second, Blackout Strike will more smoothly fit into the rotation. We're going to try it having a cooldown, but Tiger Palm significantly reducing that cooldown, such that you can Blackout Strike every few GCDs, and not have any forced partial-second pauses. We want to make sure that Energy (and thus Haste) controls the speed of your rotation, so that that's in your control. If you want a more full, button-spammy rotation, you can favor Haste. If you prefer being more tactical with your GCDs, optimizing the timing of each one, you can favor other stats.And finally, to let you customize the rotation with both higher GCD utilization and some variance, we're planning to add a talent that gives Tiger Palm a high chance to reset the cooldown of Breath of Fire. (Where exactly to put that talent is unclear; replacing Chi Burst is the current idea, but we're not super thrilled with that.)

Defensive AbilitiesOverall, Stagger is working quite well in the general case. Ironskin vs Purify (and in particular when to Purify) is a good choice, though maybe a tad bit skewed toward Ironskin right now. However, it becomes problematic in the extreme case, where Stagger is used to cheese mechanics that aren't intended to be survivable. For example, a Brewmaster may use High Tolerance and Fortifying Brew in order to get 100% Stagger, soak several of some raid mechanic that is intended to be entirely unsurvivable (probably even piercing immunities), Purify twice quickly, and get healed through what little of the damage is remaining.

The key source of this is when Stagger reaches 100% or near-100%, and our planned changes to solve this focus on that:

We'll be reducing the Stagger gain of Fortifying Brew, and slightly reduce the Stagger gain of Ironskin Brew.We'll be raising Brewmaster's base armor to compensate.We're going to add a cap on how much damage can be Staggered (high enough that you won't hit it in normal gameplay, but enough to stop cheesing mechanics).There is also an artifact trait that increases the Stagger gain of Fortifying Brew that has been mostly-useless since 7.1.5, which we're going to redesign.

Again, the point of this is not at all to be a nerf in intended circumstances, but rather to shift around where the mitigation comes from, such that it can't be used to unintentionally bypass mechanics.

Relatedly, one mechanic that causes imbalance with tanks is that in a tank-swap situation in a raid, tanks can store up a large amount of active mitigation while not actively tanking, both in terms of ability charges, and buff durations. In general, this is fine, but it can be taken to extremes, and Brewmasters are a good example of that, frequently being able to go into their tanking with a 30+sec duration Ironskin Brew rolling. Some amount of this is fine, but to keep it within a reasonable range, we're going to put a cap on how long you can extend tank active mitigation buffs, to a maximum of twice their base duration.

Thanks for reading! We look forward to your feedback. What are you doing to address the fact that ISB has basically become the new shuffle and requires 100% uptime? That's literally brew gameplay right now -> 100% ISB uptime and anything left goes into purify.

I touched on that a bit, that the decision is skewed a tad bit towards Ironskin Brew right now. There are 3 changes here that will help with that:

The increase to base armor will help you feel like Ironskin Brew falling off is a death sentence.

Our current plan for the mentioned artifact trait replacement is Purify percentage, which will increase the value of Purifying.

How does a talent like Tiger Palm resetting Breath Fire work when you have the legendary chest? Clearly we wouldn't take it since Keg is resetting breath about every 5 seconds. With both it would be absurd.

Occasional legendaries that push you away from or toward a particular talent are generally OK. If you have the Breath of Fire chest, you likely will want to pick one of the other talents instead of Spitfire (the Tiger Palm resets Breath of Fire one), and that's OK.

Will there be exceptions added to this rule? For example, will this not just completely negate the use of the 'Bastion of Light' talent for Protection Paladins? Gaining the instant charges allows them to go much further beyond the "twice their base duration", essentially throwing away all that additional SotR uptime that comes from the talent during the activation window.

There may be, yes. We don't want to invalidate any existing gameplay, just prevent the "I've been offtanking for a bit and have a crazy long duration buff up when I take over, skewing my priorities.

Without hard numbers, it is difficult to see if this will be a blessing or a curse.

Numbers matter for performance, and I want to reemphasize the fact that the changes I'm talking about are intended to be net-neutral, performance-wise. Of course they will affect performance, but we'll offset them with number tweaks, in whichever direction is necessary.

The point of all of these is gameplay, mechanics, and particularly rotational flow.

My first concern on hearing that there is a stagger cap is what does that mean for damage intake: once you're at stagger cap, do you take full damage from hits? How do you anticipate this working on mobs like The Demon Within, which is already hitting for approximately 5 million white damage per auto set? Extrapolating further to future mythic tiers, it's not necessarily unreasonable to anticipate mobs that will be hitting a monk in excess of 7+ million white damage (for example) every 1-1.5s. Given brew generation in your most favorable circumstances, it seems there is a real possibility of brewmasters essentially hitting some upper limit of mob they're able to tank before they're essentially as squishy as a dps, save dodging, due to having capped stagger.

To be clear, the stagger cap is not on the amount you can stagger per-hit, but on the total amount you can have delayed in your "stagger bar" at once. As stated, it's mainly a limit to avoid abusive cases, similar to how spells like Guardian Spirit have a point where they stop working. If you're about to try to soak something that will do a few times your maximum health in damage (even after cooldowns), you should expect to die immediately. This should come into play only in relatively extreme cases.On the AM max duration discussion, there's been a ton of great feedback on that so far. I'd like to go into why we're considering this change a little more. Forgive me for the verbosity (hah):

This effects Brewmasters more than other tanks, but not exclusively. The main reason that this affects Brewmasters more is that they are meant to split their resource between two brews: Ironskin and Purifying.

Consider a simple situation of two bosses, each beating on a tank. The Brewmaster is using a mixture of their Brews, maintaining ISB while using excess on PB (or maybe even letting ISB fall off when the boss stops to cast something, or is otherwise unthreatening for a moment). She gets more Brew charges than she needs to keep ISB up, but she's using those excess charges on PB, so ISB duration is remaining low.

The co-tank, let's say a Warrior for example, is built a little differently, having two separate defensive resources (Shield Block charges and Rage for Ignore Pain). Both are being generated and consumed at a similar rate, also not gaining increasing Shield Block duration.

Things are good here, and let's suppose for the sake of argument the two tanks are 'balanced' in this context.

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OK, now let's change the design of the fight, to one where there's one huge boss, and the two tanks take turns tanking for 30sec at a time. Arguments of this being a less-engaging fight aside, let's look at how that affects the tank balance.

While the Warrior is OTing, he's building up Shield Block charges, but once he hits max charges, they're being wasted. He can use one at a time as they're generated, but they don't last longer than it takes to generate, so his Shield Block buff duration doesn't grow over time. Similar deal with Rage and Ignore Pain. He builds up Rage, and when that caps out, he builds up an Ignore Pain stack, but that caps out pretty quickly too. Excess Rage is wasted (at least defensively anyway; they can put it into damage). When the Warrior taunts, he goes into it with some buffer of his max Shield Block charges, maybe a single partial Shield Block buff, and max Rage and Ignore Pain. Overall, he could carry over some value from that time not tanking, but not all of it.

Meanwhile, when the Brewmaster is not tanking, they're building up charges of their single defensive resource, Brew charges. Once at max Brew charges, she starts using Ironskin Brews, as they're generated. Since there's nothing to Purify, she never does so, and all of her charges go into Ironskin Brew, creating a surplus of Ironskin duration that just grows over time. When she taunts, she goes into it with max Brew charges, and a 1min long Ironskin buff. She never has to Ironskin the whole time she's tanking, and can send all of her Brew charges into Purifying, over tripling (if not more) how often she can Purify, providing a sizable gain over her Warrior counterpart. All that time she spent not tanking goes into storing up defensive value for when she is tanking, with no limit.

If the two tanks were 'balanced' in the first fight, then the Brewmaster is overpowered in the second. Alternatively, if you argue that they're balanced in the second fight, that means they're underpowered in the first. The goal of this change is to place a reasonable limit on how much value you can carry over from time spent not tanking, so that we can tune the tanks to be balanced in both of these situations, not just one of them.

I totally get that right now you can always get benefit out of hitting Ironskin Brew, never being fully wasted, and so the prospect of going to a system where there may be a time where you're just sitting on full charges, wasting them sounds like a negative. Please understand that for most other tanks, that's just normal; a Warrior that's not tanking is just wasting the defensive value of their Shield Block charges once at max charges, and that's just an accepted norm. By bringing Brewmasters into parity in this regard, we can then tune them to be more consistently balanced with other tanks, which is the core goal of the change.

One of the most common responses so far has been "I understand wanting a cap, but 2x*duration is too short". Totally reasonable argument, and we'll need your help finding what the right cap is. We chose that to start with because that's consistent with things like Ignore Pain, Mark of Ursol, Blood Shield, Soul Fragments, etc. Given the more liberal use of Brew charges, it may be more appropriate to be higher for Brewmasters.

I'd love to keep hearing your thoughts on this, and I hope that this massively-over-verbose post helped better explain our thought process here. Thanks to those of you that stuck with it, reading it all the way through. :)

How much of a threshold are we talking? One stagger bar? Two? Five? Ten?

When we reach this threshold, what happens? Do we begin to take unmitigated hits? Will stagger simply stop working? If so, what's the plan for taking an unmitigated raid boss hit, as a few bosses are capable of 100-0% a 910 brewmaster in a single swing?

The current idea is that the Stagger bar that the UI shows is the cap, which matches up with your health bar, since that'll be the most understandable and intuitive. Then, however much of a buff to max health is needed to make that balanced.

Example, with 80% Stagger, 33% Armor for convenient numbers:

HP: 100/100 ~ Stagger: 0/100

Take a hit for 30, armor reduces that to 20, then stagger takes 16, and 4 goes through to HP.HP: 96/100 ~ Stagger: 16/100

Time passes and 8 of the Stagger damage goes over into HP.HP: 88/100 ~ Stagger: 8/100

Then you take a big hit for 60, armor reduces that to 40, then stagger takes 32, and 8 goes through to HP.HP: 80/100 ~ Stagger: 40/100

You quickly Purify 50% of that.HP: 80/100 ~ Stagger: 20/100

Then you take a *massive* hit for 210 (something cheesy), armor reduces that to 140. Stagger would take 112, but there's only room for 80 in your Stagger bar. So Stagger takes 80, and 60 goes through to HP.HP: 20/100 ~ Stagger: 100/100

TL;DR: The Stagger bar on your UI is now representative of your maximum stagger pool, and any overflow damage continues on into your HP bar.Alright, second round is on me as well, Brewmasters. Now that the weekend is over, we've had a chance to discuss all the great feedback you all have provided so far. Here's what we're thinking:

(Note that the below changes likely won't make it into the first PTR build.)

Stagger CapAs I said, the goal of this was cheese-prevention, not intended to impact normal gameplay. A Stagger cap of 100%*HP has a lot of value to us due to it functioning intuitively within the UI. We had hoped that the amount we need to buff HP/Armor would be reasonable in order to make that work, but looking at the numbers and your feedback, we don't think there's enough room there. Therefore, we're now leaning toward a 200%*HP cap, and that just won't be visible in the UI (but then, neither is the cap of Guardian Spirit and the like).

Active Mitigation Duration CapThere has been a ton of useful feedback about this topic. Being able to carry over a ton of banked Active Mitigation (and Ironskin Brew absolutely is AM in context) from tank swaps and low damage phases is extremely powerful, and contributes to imbalance between tanks. But we're also sympathetic to how it adds an additional complication that you need to keep in your mental space. We think that just loosening the restriction up a bit so that the window you can safely press Ironskin Brew in is much wider will satisfy that, so we're going to try a cap of 3x Duration instead of 2x. And to clarify, calling this "base duration" was inaccurate; I meant the duration of a single cast of Ironskin Brew, including traits (so 3x Duration would be 24sec with 4/4 of that trait).

Magic DRWe've talked about having armor and potentially HP as tuning knobs to use. We also have the % of Stagger that applies to Magic to use. All of the changes we're discussing in this thread are for mechanical and playstyle reasons, and then tuning is a separate (but big and important) issue. Just to set expectations, Brewmasters with Mystic Vitality are currently seen as extremely strong against Magic damage, sometimes overpowered. Guardian Druids are also overpowered against Magic damage, and that will be adjusted as well.

Thanks, and keep the feedback coming!Another point of feedback is that Brew charges feel totally wasted when not tanking (or in a low damage phase), whereas on other tanks they can at least get some offensive value out of them.

This is rather experimental, but we're going to try adding an additional effect to Purifying Brew: "Also increases the damage of your next Breath of Fire by 50%." (tuning not final of course).

And FYI, it looks like we are going to be able to fit these latest changes (this one included) into the first PTR build.

A smarter approach to the cheesing problem, is a 'stagger-per-strike' limit.

A per-hit Stagger limit is not a possible option, since the damage in question is not guaranteed to be a single hit. Ex: Something like Spellblade's Annihilation, or a pack of many adds.

Blizzard

Today's PTR build has a number of changes for Brewmasters. Continuing to iterate based on feedback, we've done the following things:

- Removed the Tiger Palm -> Blackout Strike interaction, and dropped Blackout Strike back to a 3sec cooldown (but still unaffected by Haste). This should provide a simple BoS - X - X rotation that is extremely flexible.- Returned Breath of Fire to a 15sec cooldown. There's enough room in the rotation for it to be back at its previous usage rate.- Moved Spitfire down to the level 90 talent row, preserving the level 15 talent row as is on live, replacing Niuzao instead. The level 90 row is a DPS row though, with no direct survivability value. To offset the increased usage of BoF that Spitfire allows, the Hot Blooded artifact trait now provides half as much benefit when you have Spitfire. Yes, this makes Spitfire directly incompatible with the legendary chest, and that's OK.

It also has one highly experimental change: Blackout Combo now also reduces Blackout Strike's cooldown to 2sec, and the other level 110 talents have been adjusted to preserve talent balance. I say highly experimental because this is something we were trying out internally, but didn't work out too well.

We found it to be too frantic, too much pressure to not miss any BoSs due to BoS having a survivability benefit now, and too restrictive on the rotation. It also meant that you had to avoid all of the talents that add anything to your rotation, because your GCDs are completely full, even with no talents that add GCDs, even with no Haste, etc.

There are enough ways to customize your GCD utilization now that you can fill up nearly all of your GCDs with the 3sec Blackout Strike if you want to (and it doesn't require a ton of Haste). As such, we're planning to return to a 3sec Blackout Strike (both with and without Blackout Combo), and let you fill up however much of that time that you want. I think you'll find that you can fill that time (or not) pretty easily. Regardless, the 2sec version made it into this build, so give it a try and let us know if your experience matches ours or not.

As always, feedback on any of this is welcome and appreciated.

P.S. One tweak to High Tolerance and Elusive Dance that we're likely going to keep is raising their benefits at Light Stagger, so that you still get most of their value even when not getting smashed.

It's definitely a significant change for high skill players. It's definitely a nerf, on its own, for those players, in some situations. However, it's a good nerf. And I don't just mean in terms of a theoretical 'better game', I mean it's a nerf that is in your personal benefit.

In simple terms, Brewmasters are currently strong in situations where they can exploit this, and weak in situations where they can't. By reducing your ability to exploit this, we can then also tune you up across the board (and have, if you notice the rest of the changes), so that you're strong in both situations.

TL;DR: The ISB duration change is a nerf in some situations for some players, that is compensated for with buffs in all situations for all players, resulting in a net gain for you.Lots of great feedback here on the latest build so far. Thanks.

Latest thoughts:Spitfire - It's a fun playstyle option for people, but having both defensive (even without it being an increase to Hot Blooded, it's still more Elusive Brawler stacks) and offensive value (more Breath of Fires for damage), it's hard to fit it anywhere in the talent tree, and it complicates artifact trait values. We're going to just cut if for now (may return at some point in the future when it fits in better). Niuzao will return, and will simply deal more damage to make him competitive with the row.

Blackout Combo - Yeah, the 2sec rotation is problematic. Some people like the frantic gameplay, but we think other talent combinations deliver on that better anyway. The main problems with it are that it invalidates a ton of other talent choices, actually *reduces* rotational choice because you just combo everything instead of having to choose what you combo, causes energy capping issues, is a massive buff to the talent potentially upsetting talent balance, and is too fast-paced without any other contribution. We're going to return it to 3sec, where you can pair it with other GCD-filling talents to create the frantic playstyle if you prefer, without causing the above issues.

Hot Blooded and Dragonfire Brew - Baseline, Hot Blooded is very strong. 1% DR per bronze trait is already on the extremely strong side. The Legendary chest was created with Hot Blooded in mind as its defensive benefit. But that gets a little out of hand when we added 4th points to Bronzes, and you min/max relics, increasing it to the massively-OP level of 7% DR for a legendary. Then the 7.2.5 changes also add more Elusive Brawler stacks to that. We're going to adjust these two traits in order to better balance trait and legendary values: Dragonfire Brew will also increase the duration of Breath of Fire's DoT by 100%, giving it defensive value. Hot Blooded will now be active the whole time, instead of ~half the time without the Chest, and so is changing to 1% DR per point to compensate.

EDIT: Overall Tuning - As always, overall tuning happens late in the process. Don't worry about overall power level of Brewmasters when giving feedback on these changes.

Thanks all!I have a feeling theres a disconnect between how much the monk community value those elusive brawler stack and how the Developpers value them.

First off, as said many times, dodge doesn't do anything VS magic damage or VS any kind of boss threatening ability as they are undodgeable even if physical (ex: spellblade annihilate).

From a mythic raider point of view, those dodge stacks hardly do anything, as bosses auto-attack (the only thing that's dodgeable) are the least threatening form of damage we have to face.

From a M+ dungeon point of view, those stack comes and go so fast nobody will notice the buff... having 100% dodge chance for 1 auto-attack out of the 5+ weak mob training you hardly change anything...

It's also one of the reason people hardly, if ever, use blackout combo to empower purify.

We value it based upon its actual real world value, not a theoretical worst case that doesn't actually exist. You should too.

Yes, Elusive Brawler does nothing against Magic/undodgeable damage. However, apart from some extremely niche situations like Star Auger, it's not that piercing damage alone that kills you; it's the combination of those and other damage that is dodgeable. Nowhere is this more true than on Brewmasters, where there is no spike damage, only smoothed total damage (which is mostly auto attack damage). Mastery drastically reduces the total damage you take, which is the only thing scary to a Brewmaster anyway.

Specialization

Enveloping Mist Wraps the target in healing mists, healing for (990% of Spell power) over 6 sec Mistweaver (Level 32) and increasing healing received from your other spells by 0%

Vivify Causes a surge of invigorating mists around the target, healing them and their 2 nearest injured allies for (275%300% of Spell power).Cost changed from 4.5% of base mana to 4.0% of base manaEssence Font Unleashes a rapid twirl of healing bolts at up to 6 allies within 25 yds, every 1.002 sec for 3 sec. Each bolt heals a target for (110%135% of Spell power) Mistweaver (Level 58) plus an additional (36%48% of Spell power) over 6 sec.8 sec.Gust of Mists will heal affected targets twiceCastable while moving.Cost changed from 8.0% of base mana to 7.2% of base manaCooldown changed from None to 12 sec cooldownEssence Font Each bolt of Essence Font heals a target for an additional (36%48% of Spell power) over 6 sec.8 sec.Gust of Mists will heal affected targets twice.

Life Cocoon Encases the target in a cocoon of Chi energy for 12 sec, absorbing 31.16442) + 1)) * (1 + Versatility)] damage and increasing all healing over time received by 50%.

Refreshing Jade Wind Summon a whirling tornado around you, causing 9] healing over 613] healing over 9 sec to up to 6 allies within 810 yards, and increasing the healing of Essence Font by 20% while active.Cost changed from 5.0% of base mana to 3.5% of base manaCooldown changed from 6 sec cooldown to 9 sec cooldown

Honor Talents

Way of the Crane Increases your Physical damage by 50%, you remove and become immune to all stun, snare and root effects and you heal up to 3 nearest allies for 200% of all damage done. Lasts 15 sec.

Ancient Mistweaver Arts Soothing Mist is now an active spell, and no longer is automatically applied through casting Effuse, Enveloping Mist or Vivify.

Soothing Mist - 0.3%0.2% per second

Blizzard Posts

Blizzard

On the initial 7.2.5 PTR, we are trying out a version of Essence Font that is even stronger, but has a cooldown. In addition to some combination of a healing increase and mana cost reduction, the duration of the HoT will be increased.

Essence Font having no cooldown has held back the spell and the spec in a few ways. It essentially says that three relatively heavy heals (Essence Font, Enveloping Mist, Vivify) have to compete with each other at all times. The texture of using a heavy spell on a short cooldown, then falling back to the decision between spammable spells (selecting based on cost, number of targets, etc.) is common among healers for good reason. And Essence Font's HoT mechanic that improves mastery is meant to specifically enhance that sort of gameplay, and will be more effective on a spell with a cooldown.

As already mentioned, the first change that comes along with it is buffing Essence Font itself. It no longer has to be held back by "if it gets too much stronger than e.g. Vivify, people will only use Essence Font", and can simply be a high-priority spell. We will make other adjustments as needed for gameplay or tuning.

Blizzard

However, one point that I would like addressed is what are we supposed to do when Essence Font is on cooldown, Uplifting Trance isn't available, Whispers of Shaohao has been used, and the the group still needs to be healed?

The initial version going out has a small buff to baseline Vivify. Also, the changes greatly increase the practical value of mastery, which is a hidden buff to the Vivify, Enveloping Mist, and Effuse casts you'll be making in between Essence Fonts.

Part of it, though, is you should have more of cadence between the high-priority heals that somewhat solve problems on their own, and the spells that don't always do that. You asked what to do when the "best" 3 or 4 things are on cooldown or not available, and that's similar to a Druid falling back to laying down Rejuvenations when she can't use Wild Growth or Swiftmend, or a Paladin using Flash of Light between Light of Dawn and Holy Shock cooldowns. Making use of the no-cooldown spells that are more limited is meant to be a moment when you look forward to the next heavy hitter coming back (even if it's just a few seconds for an Essence Font).

The concerns in feedback seem to mostly reflect tuning--that the "filler" kit of Vivify, Enveloping Mist, Effuse, and Soothing Mist isn't strong enough. Possibly that's true and the problem has been papered over on live by the ability to focus everything on Essence Font. Overall tuning will be something to watch on PTR, as with any spec getting any degree of shakeup. Tuning debates usually aren't too productive in early feedback, but maybe a helpful thing to say is: "if we hadn't been making any changes to Mistweaver, it would probably have gotten a small flat throughput buff before the next raid."

With the changes to Mistweaver during the transition to Legion, there was already a degree of homogenization from what was previously a fairly unique gameplay experience to something more similar to what already existed in other healing classes. As you consider further changes to Mistweaver, is further samey-ness something that's "on the radar"?

It is, although possibly in the opposite way. If anything, thinking that Essence Font had to be forced into an off-cooldown design from the start "just to be different" probably didn't help anybody. The spec flowing better for everyone using it matters more than symmetries or antisymmetries between specs and how they look on paper. Nobody actually playing either spec is going to forget whether they're on a Mistweaver or a Resto Druid just because Essence Font follows a successful design like Wild Growth. The spells around them, the different interactions they have, and the whole pile of talents, traits, and item bonuses all doing different things ensures that.

There's always a balance between lessons and good designs that are generally true throughout the game, and variance between specs. And powerful AoE heals usually having some cooldown (for a number of reasons) is a factor that's more likely to improve Mistweaver gameplay than worrying about being a carbon copy of other specs (which it's pretty far from, all things considered).

Blizzard

Refreshing Jade Wind also has a mana cost reduction that didn't make it into this build, similar to other talented heal spells mentioned in a recent PTR note.We're looking into a some of the various things mentioned on this thread and others, for an upcoming PTR build:

--We understand the complaint about losing your Essence Font channel due to movement, now that it has a cooldown. Going straight to "Essence Font can always be cast while moving" is still the sort of thing we want to be careful about. Cast-while-moving isn't something that should proliferate too much outside of special buffs or spells that have that as a main purpose, but it's an option that we may try out on PTR.

--We'll buff Life Cocoon to better account for the large HP inflation in Legion.

--We're going to try a version of Refreshing Jade Wind that no longer has the Essence Font hook, and is much more efficient simply based on its own healing. That likely means making it cheaper rather than stronger, and probably means a longer cooldown or duration than what it has now. Both so that it's less disruptive by using fewer GCDs, and so that it's not a limitless way of pouring mana into smart healing. It should be a basic rotational option for a constant healing boost, with a positional factor.

--We're going to buff Rising Thunder, initially simply using the same knob as in beta of changing Rising Sun Kick's cost. That version of fistweaving was generally popular (among the crowd that wants something with that much complexity), and possibly only fell away because it was never tuned back up enough to account for the loss of the beta version of Black Flame.

Our overall approach to Mistweaver in 7.2.5 is more focused on looking at specific issues like these, rather than any kind of deep overhaul. We also expect that the overall package of changes so far effects an increase to the total healing power of the spec (which was intended), and of course can do further tuning as we get a more solid idea of how much that is.

Blizzard

It is an astute observation that Windwalker has very little scaling with its weapon DPS. It's not something we have a short-term fix for, and we recognize the problem relating to relic choice. Longer-term, it's probably best for us to reevaluate the difference between weapondamage-based attacks and AP-based attacks entirely, and what purpose it serves.

To be clear, being focused mostly on AP-based attacks doesn't impair your overall scaling with ilvl--your AP still increases in the correct proportion as you upgrade all of your items. It just means that weapons make up less of the pie (and armor fills up more of it) for Windwalker compared to other specs. It would be nicer to clean this all up so that weapons were consistently important on all specs, and so that we didn't run into things like the relic choice issue.

Rushing Jade WindWindwalker:Summons a whirling tornado around you, causing damage over 6 sec to enemies within 8 yards. Applies Mark of the Crane to up to 4 nearby targets.2 nearby targets.

Artifact Traits

Split Personality Reduces the cooldown of Serenity / recharge time of Storm, Earth, and Fire by 3 sec.5 sec.Rank 2: Reduces the cooldown of Serenity / recharge time of Storm, Earth, and Fire by 6 sec.10 sec.Rank 3: Reduces the cooldown of Serenity / recharge time of Storm, Earth, and Fire by 9 sec.15 sec.Rank 4: Reduces the cooldown of Serenity / recharge time of Storm, Earth, and Fire by 12 sec.20 sec.Rank 5: Reduces the cooldown of Serenity / recharge time of Storm, Earth, and Fire by 15 sec.24 sec.Rank 6: Reduces the cooldown of Serenity / recharge time of Storm, Earth, and Fire by 18 sec.28 sec.Rank 7: Reduces the cooldown of Serenity / recharge time of Storm, Earth, and Fire by 21 sec.31 sec.Rank 8: Reduces the cooldown of Serenity / recharge time of Storm, Earth, and Fire by 24 sec.34 sec.

NEW Consumes up to 10 stacks of Tigereye Brew to empower your Physical abilities with wind for 2 sec per stack consumed. Damage of your strikes are reduced, but bypass armor.For each 3 Chi you consume, you gain a stack of Tigereye Brew.New level 46 Honor Talent

Heavy-Handed Strikes Your first strike of Fists of Fury knocks targets to the ground, stunning them for 3 sec. Fists of Fury has a 5 yard increased range.4 sec.

Blizzard

The increased range is becoming baseline for PvE, so that's why.

Correct, Fists of Fury is gaining a range increase baseline, so this part of the Honor Talent has been removed.

Mistweaver Way of the Crane causes Spinning Crane Kick to heal for 100% of damage dealt (was 200%).Way of the Crane now heals based on absorbed damage.Way of the Crane now costs 8% of base mana. WindwalkerTemplate Versatility increased from 100% to 120%.Template Haste increased from 175% to 200%.

Increases the duration of your Judgment effect by 16 sec Judgment now applies Lawbringer to its initial targets hits for 30 sec. Casting Judgment causes all enemies with your Lawbringer effect to suffer 5% of their total health in Holy damage.

Hammer of Reckoning Hurls a magical hammer that strikes an enemy for (700% of Spell power) Holy damage. When you or allies with your Greater Blessings take damage, the damage of your next Hammer of Reckoning increases.When you or allies with your Greater Blessings take damage, you gain Reckoning. Consume 50 stacks of Reckoning to hurl a magical hammer that strikes an enemy for (700% of Spell power) Holy damage, and you gain Avenging Wrath for 12 sec / Crusade for 6 sec.

Blessing of Sanctuary Instantly removes all stun, silence, fear and horror effects from the friendly target and reduces the duration of future such effects by 60% for 5 sec.Cooldown changed from 30 sec cooldown to 1 min cooldown

Seraphim's Blessing When you or nearby allies within 40 yards drop below 40% health, you gain CrusadeCrusadeAvenging Wrath for 5 secyour next Flash of Light cast within 5 sec is instant. This effect cannot occur more than once every 60 sec.15 sec.

Talents

Fervent Martyr Casting Holy Light or Flash of Light on your Beacon of LightHoly Light and Flash of Light reduces the mana cost and damage taken from your next Light of the Martyr by 50%25%, stacking.

Light's Hammer Hurls a Light-infused hammer into the ground, where it blasts a 10 yard radius every 2 sec for 14 sec. Each blast deals (103.2% of Spell power) Holy damage to enemies and heals up to 6 allies for (50% of Spell power).Cost changed from 35.0% of base mana to 28.0% of base mana

Honor Talents

Light's Grace Increases the healing done by your Holy Light by 100%50%, and your Holy Light reduces all damage the target receives by 5% for 8 sec. Stacks up to 3 times.

Artifact Traits

Eye of Tyr Releases a blinding flash from Truthguard, causing (270% of Attack power) Holy damage to all nearby enemies within 8 yds and reducing all damage they deal to you by 25% for 9 sec.

Blessed Stalwart Your Judgment grants you Blessed Stalwart, increasing the damage and damage reduction of your next Shield of the Righteous by 25%8%.

Artifact Traits

Blessing of the Ashbringer When your Greater Blessings are active, gain Blessing of the Ashbringer. Blessing of the Ashbringer grants 20004% Strength.

Penance Launches a volley of holy light at the target, causing Castigation

Holy damagedamage Disciplineto an enemy or healing to an ally<br /> over 2 sec. Castable while moving.

A quick, efficient plea to heal an ally for (225% of Spell power). Mana cost increased by 100% for each Atonement you have activeCost changed from 0.4% of base mana to 1.8% of base manaPower Word: Radiance A burst of light heals the target and 24 injured allies within 30 yards for (250% of Spell power), and applies Atonement for 60% of its normal duration.Cast Time changed from 2.5 sec cast to 2 sec castCooldown changed from None to 18 sec rechargeCharges changed from None to 2 ChargesPower Word: Shield Shields an ally for 15 sec, absorbing damage, and preventing damage from delaying spellcasting.Cost changed from 2.0% of base mana to 2.3% of base mana

Power Word: Barrier Summons a holy barrier to protect all allies at the target location for 10 sec, reducing all damage taken by 25% and preventing damage from delaying spellcasting.Cost changed from 6.3% of base mana to 4.0% of base mana

Talents

Clarity of Will Shields the target with a protective ward for 20 sec, absorbing damage.Now requires Level 75, down from 90Tier 5 Talent, in place of Power Infusion

Divine Star Throw a Divine Star forward 24 yds, healing allies in its path for (90% of Spell power) and dealing (145% of Spell power) Holy damage to enemies. After reaching its destination, the Divine Star returns to you, healing allies and damaging enemies in its path again.Cost changed from 2.5% of base mana to 2.0% of base mana

Halo Creates a ring of Holy energy around you that quickly expands to a 30 yd radius, healing allies for (287.4% of Spell power) and dealing (431.1% of Spell power) Holy damage to enemies.Cost changed from 3.6% of base mana to 2.7% of base mana

Penance may be cast on a friendly target, healing them for over 2 sec.Now Discipline ability

Contrition Increases Atonement duration by 3 sec.Now Removed

Power InfusionDiscipline:Infuses you with power for 20 sec, increasing haste by 25% and reducing the mana cost of all spells by 20%25%

NEW Extends the duration of all of your active Atonements by 87 sec.Tier 7 Talent, in place of Shadow CovenantCooldown changed from 1 min cooldown to 1.25 min cooldown

Purge the Wicked Cleanses the target with fire, causing (100% of Spell power) Fire damage and an additional (480%500% of Spell power) Fire damage over 20 sec. Spreads to an additional nearby enemy when you cast Penance on the target.Now requires Level 90, down from 100Tier 6 Talent, in place of Clarity of WillNEW Smite's absorption effect is increased by 50%.Tier 5 Talent, in place of Twist of FateShadow Covenant Draws on the power of shadow to heal up to 5 injured allies within 30 yds of the target for (450%500% of Spell power), but leaves a shell on them that absorbs the next 450%500% of Spell power) * 50 / 100] healing they receive within 6 sec.

Effect #1 Heal Value: 0 (SP mod: 4.55)

Now requires Level 75, down from 100Tier 5 Talent, in place of Contrition

Artifact Traits

Aegis of Wrath Power Word: Shield absorbs 50% additional damage, but the target takes 3% of the remaining absorb amount as Shadow damageabsorb amount decays by 3% every 1 sec.

Power of the Dark Side Purge the WickedPurge the WickedShadow Word: Pain has a chance to increase damage The Penitentor healing donedealt by your next Penance by 50%. Discipline (Level 1)or healing donedealt by your next Penance by 50%.

Honor Talents

Ultimate Radiance Your Power Word: Radiance is now instant cast and the healing is increased by 250% but now has a 6 sec cooldown.200%.

Blizzard Posts

Blizzard

The reduction to Divinity's bonus is reverted in the next PTR build. That actually wasn't meant to go to PTR after the buffs to Halo and Divine Star (if we'd kept the Divinity change, we'd likely have buffed the spec flat at the same time). Sorry about the confusion.

As with other specs, we'd like to get some discussion early in the PTR process about our goals for any significant changes, so that people giving feedback have context for what we're expecting.

First, some problems with live Discipline:--The mana cost mechanic on is clumsy and makes the spell require a complex evaluation to use at all.--Relatedly, PW:Radiance is a no-cooldown Atonement applicator that is better than in almost every way, and is basically limited only by total mana.--So the spec is now balanced around very high Atonement count in raids (from using Radiance as much as possible) being the only time Discipline is strong. High-end players have gotten used to this as a playstyle as well.--The spec is very dependent on mana, since more mana turning into more Radiances is virtually the only thing constraining your healing.

We understand that toppling any aspect of this situation gives alarm to high-end raiders, mainly related to power level of the spec. There was one way to make the spec "work" in raids, and the dedicated Discipline players have learned to optimize it to get good performance. And we can probably start assuaging some concerns by saying: without using all nearly your mana on concentrated Radiance usage, and without using focused Innervates to push that even further, we understand the power level of the spec would be clearly impacted absent other changes.

It is our intention to have fewer average Atonements out in raids after the patch, which will likely involve an increase to either Atonement transfer or simply to damage dealt. This, among other results, should result in an increase in power in all situations other than mass spread raid healing. And even in that situation, there's no overall reduction in power intended, other than perhaps in extreme cases of Innervate stacking. Ideally, Discipline will more regularly and stably be near that level of performance through a normal playstyle.

Because the spec is so complex, there will surely a lot of tuning of mana costs and damage amounts and the like throughout PTR, to get everything into the right place. But for some further goals on the changes that are in so far:--The damage increase is on Smite (I believe this PTR build only has a small damage increase, but the internal build has a much larger one) moreso than Penance. So that your incentive is not to spam out as many Atonements as possible and then convert them to healing with Penance. A decision of more Atonements vs. more damage should be more relevant than it is now, when more Atonements are essentially always right.--For similar reasons, reducing mana costs to free up overall mana on the spec was done to Smite rather than . Smite should never feel wrong to cast, whereas shifting to cast a heal spell is an expenditure of mana to get an Atonement, very similar to any heal on a typical healer.--PW:R going to more, shorter Atonements rather than fewer, longer Atonements is to allow a quick payoff on a lot of targets (5 or 10) through a Penance and some Smites. Cases such as group damage in dungeon healing should have a tool that's a smoother fit for them now.

These details are very much open to feedback like anything else, but the main point at the outset is: we're very aware we're poking at the one trick of a spec that is a bit of a one-trick pony in raids. And that requires making sure that all the other parts of the toolkit are up to snuff in the same process. Our hope is that it's not only a clear upgrade for everyone outside the high-end raid setting, but also that those players have a less degenerate and more varied rotation while still performing at the right level.Thanks for the post. Any thoughts on making penance heal untalented again? IMO the spec is way hard to play in most situations for the average player. I found myself having a hard time keeping up tanks spike damage in 5 mans, even when out gearing the content.

This is in the current PTR build--Penance can be used in either mode baseline.

Also, the problem of the time used to apply Radiances is an issue, because the casting time has to be considered into how long you actually get to make use of those Atonements.

Yes, the current cast time and duration might be a little constrained--both are potential things to look at as we see how it plays out. The payoff from a PWR shouldn't feel like it's overly conditioned on getting an exact sequence of a few spells with no interruption.

Yeah, sure, makes sense, except one crucial point... you removed the Smite absorb per-cast. That was the one feature about the spell that actually favored having fewer Atonements. A Smite that heals 5 people now does actually even less healing than before, and while it's nice and all that it costs almost no mana, it's the time constraint on Disc now to actually cast Smite that creates a problem.

It's true that works against lower-Atonement healing somewhat. Overall this effect should work as a talent since it's somewhat situational in a way that contrasts nicely to Castigation, but there could be something different here if it becomes a problem. is definitely better baseline since it's an option that is rarely a net power increase to use, but allows some important convenience/flexibility in some cases.

Lack of mana is not why Smite is not cast. Smite is not cast because by the time you're done doing everything else in the spec that costs a GCD, nobody with Atonement is still damaged unless you're on a fight that has literally constant damage every second from start to finish or your fellow healers are really, really bad at the game.

If nobody in the raid is damaged, then basically no healer has anything to do other than 1) set up something like a HoT (analogy: apply an Atonement), or 2) do some damage. So that's not unusual, and favors making sure that Smite is near-free or free and the mana decisions are on applying the heals (Atonements).There are various things still being discussed, so it will be better to talk about it after some changes settle down more, but one good point of feedback was about the targeting on PW: Radiance. We're going to try smart targeting of some sort in the next PTR build. Details TBD, but potentially: "true smart" (lowest-HP) targeting while maintaining the current behavior of favoring targets without Atonement.

Blizzard

Thanks for all the feedback. As I mentioned last week, there was a lot of rapid iteration going on so it was hard to give any detailed updates. This build is a more complete set of changes that seems to be going in a good direction, though there are still some issues to work out.

--Talent balancing. In particular, Evangelism is an idea we like, but finding serious competition for it as a raid talent might be hard. It probably needs to be against heavier hitters like Power Infusion (especially if that helps it be less of a one-note cooldown stacking build). There will likely be further iteration on talent arrangement to better accommodate the new additions.

--Mana. The spell whose cost is most important for balance purposes is , because it is now the most efficient way to convert excess mana into Atonements. We reduced the cost so it would make more sense when compared against Shadow Mend and Radiance, but have to keep an eye on whether that leaves mana as a reasonable limiter on how much Atonement you can spread over the course of an encounter.

--Overall Atonement count. The changes in the last build helped fix a lot of mechanical issues, but also added a lot of raw power to the spec, particularly in terms of Atonement spread/uptime. And particularly Evangelism returns a lot of the burst-Atonement coverage that currently dominates Disc raiding. That's not necessarily a problem if everything else about the spec is working well, and it's good to continue having a bit of a niche that Disc is used to in Legion. But as discussed in my first post, if it's as easy to blanket the raid as it is on live, that limits the spec somewhat.

While this is something we'll monitor throughout PTR, especially with more internal and external raid testing, there is definitely a worry that in order to balance the spec at this point, the Atonement transfer % would have to go down, which is the opposite of the stated goal. We don't want to be in that position at the end of PTR when it's harder to make other changes.

Specialization

Holy Nova Causes an explosion of holy light around you, dealing (150%137% of Spell power) Holy damage to all enemies within 12 yds. Holy (Level 36)Has a 20% chance to reset the cooldown of Holy Fire if any targets are hit

Binding Heal Heals you, another friendly target, and a third friendly target within 20 yards for (300% of Spell power).Triggers Serendipity, reducing the remaining cooldown on both Holy Word: Serenity and Holy Word: Sanctify by 3 sec.Cost changed from 2.5% of base mana to 1.7% of base mana

Cost changed from 5.0% of base mana to 3.0% of base manaDivine Star Throw a Divine Star forward 24 yds, healing allies in its path for (90% of Spell power) and dealing (145% of Spell power) Holy damage to enemies. After reaching its destination, the Divine Star returns to you, healing allies and damaging enemies in its path again.Cost changed from 2.5% of base mana to 2.0% of base mana

Halo Creates a ring of Holy energy around you that quickly expands to a 30 yd radius, healing allies for (287.4% of Spell power) and dealing (431.1% of Spell power) Holy damage to enemies.Cost changed from 3.6% of base mana to 2.7% of base mana

Mindbender Summons a Mindbender to attack the target for 15 sec.Generates 48 Insanity each time the Mindbender attacks.

Power InfusionDiscipline:Infuses you with power for 20 sec, increasing haste by 25% and reducing the mana cost of all spells by 20%25%

Honor Talents

Driven to Madness While Voidform is not active, being attacked will grant you 5 Insanity.9 Insanity over 3 sec.

Edge of Insanity While at 100 Insanity and not in Voidform, your damage is increased by 30%20%.

Fleeting Embrace Vampiric Embrace now affects up to 3 allies, and itsEmbrace's cooldown is reduced by 50%.

Power Word: Shield Shields an ally for 15 sec, absorbing damage, and preventing damage from delaying spellcasting.Cost changed from 2.0% of base mana to 2.3% of base mana

Shadow Mania Having Vampiric Touch on 2 or more targets grants you 3 Insanity every 2 sec.Increases the healing of Vampiric Touch by 50%.

Mind Trauma Mind SpikeMind SpikeMind Flay has a 100% chance to apply Shadow Word: Pain to the target.Fully-channeled Mind Flays cause you to steal 1% haste from the target for 20 sec. Only 10% haste can be stolen from a single target.Stacks up to 20 times.

Void Shield After casting Power Word: Shield on yourself, all damage you deal heals you for 33% of the damage dealt for 5 sec.Damage dealt by Vampiric Touch is not affected.

Discipline Overloaded with Light increases Light's Wrath damage by 200% in PvP situations (was 500%).Power Word: Fortitude can now be active on 3 targets.Power Word: Fortitude's mana cost has been reduced by 80%.Power Word: Shield's absorption amount is increased by 10% in PvP situations (was 25%).Purified Resolve now provides a 5% maximum health shield (was 8%).Strength of Soul decreases physical damage taken by 20% (was 30%).Strength of Soul's heal has been increased by 75%.HolyTemplate Damage dealt decreased from 75% to 65%.Template Haste increased from 100% to 125%.Template Intellect increased from 135% to 145%.Template Mastery reduced from 100% to 75%.Divine Attendant now reduces cooldown by 2.5 minutes (was 2 minutes). Tooltip will be inaccurate till a followup hotfix.Greater Fade's duration has been reduced to 4 seconds (was 6 seconds).Ray of Hope's bonus healing has been reduced to 50% (was 100%).Renew's periodic healing has been increased by 100% in PvP situations.Spirit of the Redeemer now has a 3 minute cooldown (was 5 minutes).Spirit of the Redeemer now has a 7 second duration (was 10 seconds). Shadow Mind Blast damage increased by 30% in PvP situations.Mind Flay damage increased by 40% in PvP situations.Shadow Word: Pain damage reduced by 20% in PvP situations.Shadow Word: Void damage increased by 20% in PvP situations.Shadowform reduces physical damage taken by 20% in PvP situations (was 10%).Vampiric Touch damage reduced by 15% in PvP situationsVoid Torrent no longer deals decreased damage in PvP situations, (was 20% less.

Spells

SmiteShadow:Smites an enemy for (250%260% of Spell power) Holy damageDiscipline:Smites an enemy for (250%260% of Spell power) Holy damage and absorbs the next damage dealt by the enemyHoly:Smites an enemy for (250%260% of Spell power) Holy damage and has a 20% chance to reset the cooldown of Holy FireEffect #1 School Damage Value: 0 (SP mod: 2.52.6)

Honor Talents

Spiritual Cleansing Purify no longer has a cooldown, and costs 50% less mana, but only dispels 1 Magic and Disease effect.

Agonizing Poison Coats your weapons with a Lethal Poison that lasts for 1 hour. Each strike has a 30% chance to poison the enemy for 12 sec, increasing all damage taken from your abilities by 4.0%, stacking up to 5 times.Damage bonus increased by Mastery: Potent Poisons.Removed

Exsanguinate Twist your blades into the target's wounds, causing your Bleed effects on them to bleed out 100%150% faster.Cost changed from None to 25 Energy

The damage of your Nature damage abilities against the target is increased by 30% for 8 sec.

Awards 1 combo point.

Honor Talents

Neurotoxin Stabs the target with your off-hand weapon, causing 100% Nature damage, and applies a deadly neurotoxin for 10 sec. The neurotoxin causes any ability used to incur a 3 sec cooldown.Name changed from Shiv to Neurotoxin

Blizzard Posts

Blizzard

Legion came with a tremendous amount of class changes, and Rogues were a big part of this. We've been making adjustments/improvements to many specs since Legion has launched, and that will continue, especially for Rogues in the near future. Let's talk Rogue fantasy and mechanics a bit.

AssassinationAssassination has always had the Poison theme, but we think Bleeds pair well with Poisons here, both fantasy-wise and mechanically. The idea that you can apply a slew of Poison and Bleed damage over times to the target, dooming your enemy to certain death is one of our core fantasies for Assassination. At this point Assassination is clearly less of a "get in, kill, and get out" spec - that distinction is now more on Subtlety.

Agree that the balance of Bleeds vs. Poisons might be a little heavy on the Bleeds side currently on the baseline spec. That wasn't really super intentional. Assassination got Mutilate, Envenom, Rupture, and Garrote (probably the most obvious choices for a baseline rotation) after we divided up many of the Rogue skills between specs in 7.0. So the spec essentially already started a little Bleed-heavy. Add on top of that Blood of the Assassinated (which is fairly strong and everyone has) and Exsanguinate (which was overtuned at launch), both of which prop up bleeds more.

We like that the Assassination talent tree has two thematic paths - Poison (Master Poisoner + Agonizing Poison) and Bleed (Hemorrhage + Exsanguinate). But we lean on our talent trees to do so much more than just let you choose between 2 thematic paths for your spec fantasy - they have to offer simple passives vs. added complexity via new buttons, single target vs. AOE mechanics, playstyle/pacing customization, and more. And of course, all of this is extremely sensitive to the tuning and design of talents, set bonuses, legendaries, and artifact traits. Any one of these variables could be newly introduced or overtuned/undertuned and easily push Assassination down either the Poison or Bleeds talent path, essentially against your will if you like one theme over the other but want to maximize damage. For example, at Legion launch, Hemo + Exsan was the standard build, and now it's switched over to Master Poisoner + Agonizing. Tier 19 pushes Poison damage a bit via Envenom, but Tier 20 might push Bleed damage a bit via Garrote (note: T20 designs are still in flux, many are likely to change). We want to make both paths viable, but should be realistic and recognize that many variables can and will affect this, and that the balance will fluctuate over time.

On a couple talents:

Agonizing Poison : We don't really like Agonizing Poison for many reasons. It replaces Deadly Poison (which feels core to Assassination Rogue) with an extremely passive, mostly invisible, and currently very strong Poison debuff that makes target-swapping and AOE more difficult. It's got a lot of things going wrong with it and is on the chopping block for the next patch. Ideas for replacements include a short-cooldown AOE Poison damage button that costs high energy or something that deals Poison damage in a rotationally-interesting way.

Exsanguinate : This is a good talent. It has a clear theme with interesting mechanical and rotational implications. We'll look at tuning based on what happens with Agonizing Poison, but plans are to buff its damage and add a small energy cost, not because of tuning but because on-GCD buttons that don't cost Energy sometimes lead to Energy-capping, which doesn't feel good.

Overall we think the single-target Assassination rotation is in a good place. There are nuances to applying and maintaining your bleeds with maximizing Envenom uptime being an underlying core part of the rotation, as it has been for a long time.

NEW Restless Blades Finishing moves reduce the remaining cooldown of Adrenaline Rush, Between the Eyes, Sprint, Grappling Hook, Cannonball Barrage, Killing Spree, Marked for Death, Death from Above and Vanish by 0.5 sec per combo point spent.

Killing Spree Teleport to an enemy within 10 yards, attacking 7 times over 3 sec for 260% Physical damage with your main-hand and 260% Physical damage with your off-handwith both weapons for a total of (260% * 7 + 260% * 7) Physical damage. While Blade Flurry is active, each Killing Spree attack will teleport to and damage a different nearby enemy target.

Curse of the Dreadblades Invoke the Curse of the Dreadblades, causing each Saber Slash, Ghostly Strike, Ambush, or Pistol Shot to fill your combo points. However, The Dreadblades will consume 5% of your current health when you use a finishing move for the next 12 sec.

Blizzard

OutlawThe pirate theme is clear, and clearly contentious. I think it would be accurate to say there are many players who like the fantasy of the spec and many who don't. As a class with 3 specs of the same role, this is probably an okay place to be in.

The first part is tuning each of the single-buffs against each other, narrowing the gap in power level between any two single-buffs. You should see this when the next patch hits PTR.

The second part is more complex - we're considering removing the incentive to reroll almost entirely and re-acclimating everyone to getting 1 buff from RTB most of the time and not rerolling. The main problem involves ensuring the average expected value of casting Roll the Bones is close enough to 1.0 buffs that it's not better to reroll. With either the current 6-dice or an alternate 5-dice natural system, the probabilities are such that it's too lucrative to reroll when you get a single-buff right now.

The current proposal is to reduce the number of dice being rolled from 6 to 5 and to hand-set probabilities to something like 79% chance for 1-buff, 20% chance for 2-buffs, and 1% chance for 5-buffs (yahtzee), bringing the expected value of a roll down to 1.24 buffs (plus additional value for synergies between buffs). The downside to this is that if you take a deep look at the probability distribution, in order for this to work, you realize that the dice would have to be loaded against the player. This isn't something we'd prefer to do (adjust randomness against the player's favor), but it might be something we have to do with the current Roll the Bones dice system in order to remove the incentive to reroll.

Overall we want to reduce how much the spec is defined by Roll the Bones. RTB can be most of the time a single buff that might change your pacing or rotation slightly with relatively rare bonuses of 2-buffs or 5-buffs, but that the spec should completely work both mechanically and damage-wise without RTB, if you want to take Slice and Dice as a replacement.

Smooth out Energy Generation : Outlaw suffers a bit rotationally from unpredictable Energy generation and Energy-flooding during Adrenaline Rush. The changes we're doing here are pretty simple and direct but should help to alleviate this issue - Adrenaline Rush reduced Energy regen increase but increased duration and Combat Potency procs twice as often for half the Energy each proc.

I dont think the first point of one rtb buff will ever be possible. There will always be a buff sought after more than the others, and if you were to somehow put a CD on rtb for the duration of the buff to lockout rerolls it will simply feel punishing to play the class.

The second idea I think has a lot more merit, taking out one of the buffs will greatly improve getting a good combo. I enjoy outlaw as a playstyle for the most part, the only time I ever feel punished for playing the spec is when I'm trying to fish for TB and continue to get any one buff besides that. So I am all for your second idea here. Personally I think Grand Melee wont be missed.

To be clear, the (tentative) proposal is to reduce the number of dice, not the number of possible buffs (the dice remain d6's).

Players finding certain cases where rerolling has some use is not the end of the world. But the goal is similar to what we expressed way back in beta--rerolling, and especially very frequent rerolling, aren't a major part of standard gameplay. That's still the goal, and it wasn't borne out on live so far, and the feedback has been very consistent with the notion that we should still try to get there.

Some variance in Roll the Bones buff values is inevitable, not necessarily a problem. It doesn't even lead to rerolling, if the difference isn't large enough to be worth giving up high-damage Run Throughs. But as Seph said, in our estimation the bigger issue isn't the variance between buffs, but the variance in the number of buffs and the fact that a single buff is so far below the average outcome.

Hoooooooooooold up. Really? Because this is the first time a dev has said that they want SND to equal RTB. To this point, we've been told that SND was "an option," but intentionally not as strong as RTB.

That's a huge about-face. But one I approve of.

There's probably some miscommunication here. Slice and Dice is a level 100 talent and should of course have positive DPS value. Therefore it should be stronger, on its own, than Roll the Bones. That was always the intention, although it may not have turned out consistently true so far. Slice and Dice will, however, likely be less strong than Roll the Bones plus Marked for Death (for example).

Seph

Overall it would be more ideal if the RTB buffs were closer in value. True Bearing has gradually crept up over the course of the expansion (around the time of Legion launch, I believe Shark Infested Waters was considered best, and they haven't changed much since then). I expect True Bearing climbs in value as the rotation gets faster due to stat increases and other bonuses being added over the course of the expansion, which all feed into the True Bearing positive feedback loop. Simply making it baseline would speed up the spec even further and contribute to the energy flood and other issues that it can have. While the similar effect was passive in Warlords, I'm sure (I haven't dug into this closely) that the Legion spec churns combo points much more rapidly. In any case the Legion version of True Bearing has the added synergy with Marked For Death that heaps even more combo points into the rotation during True Bearing.

Point being, while there's not a specific plan yet for balancing out the different RTB buffs, we agree that it would be better they were more even again. Longer-term, there's something to be said for tweaking the rules/probabilities of RTB in a way that would further reduce the value of rerolling frequently.Two things I think many of us can agree on right now:

1. True Bearing's cooldown reduction per combo point spent mechanic is fun to play with. The mechanic has been on the spec for a long time as a passive with a different name (Restless Blades), and largely drove the pacing and feel of the spec.

1. The True Bearing mechanic is being added to Outlaw as a baseline passive (called Restless Blades), tuned to an appropriate pacing and power level for how many combo points the spec currently generates. Restless Blades, currently in 7.2.5 is tuned at 0.5 sec of cooldown reduction per combo point because realistically, the spec now generates easily 2-3x more combo points compared to a couple expansions ago, and the pacing impact and tuning of Restless Blades should reflect that.

2. True Bearing will remain as one of the 6 Roll the Bones buffs, but will be tuned down from 2.0 to 1.0 sec of cooldown reduction per combo point. We're serious about balancing each of the 6 individual buffs against each other, and True Bearing at 2.0 sec is clearly out of line.

We'll be keeping a close eye on Roll the Bones during 7.2.5 development, and as usual will make further tuning/adjustments as necessary.

Shadow Dance Allows use of all Stealth abilities and grants all the combat benefits of Stealth for 34 sec. Effect not broken from taking damage or attacking. Charges changed from 3 Charges to 2 Charges

SubterfugeSubtlety:Your abilities requiring Stealth can still be used for 3 sec after Stealth breaks.Also increases the duration of Shadow Dance by 2 sec.1 sec.

Soothing Darkness You heal 3% of your maximum life every 1 sec while Stealth or Shadow Dance is active.

Honor Talents

Dagger in the Dark Each second while Stealth is active, nearby enemies within 1020 yards take an additional 10% damage from your next Shadowstrike for 510 sec. Stacks up to 10 times.

Phantom Assassin Increases the duration of Shadow Dance by 3 sec, and you automatically gain Symbols of Death when you enter stealth.While Stealth or Shadow Dance is active, your critical strike chance is increased by 35%.

Shadow's Caress While in Stealth, the cooldown recovery of all your abilities is increased by 30%.Removed

Thief's Bargain Your damage while stealthed is increased by an additional 20% and The cooldown of your Vanish spell is reduced by 60 sec. Maximum health reduced by 25%.Your damage is increased by 10%, but your maximum health is reduced by 15%.

NEW Your Tricks of the Trade allows your friendly target within 20 yards to also gain your next Cloak of Shadows, Crimson Vial, Evasion, or Vanish with reduced benefits.New level 22 Honor Talent

Energetic Stabbing Cheap Shot and Shadowstrike have a 25%Gloomblade Backstab, Shadowstrike, and Cheap Shot have a 50% chance to refund 5 Energy. 2 Energy.Rank 2: Cheap Shot and Shadowstrike have a 25%Gloomblade Backstab, Shadowstrike, and Cheap Shot have a 50% chance to refund 10 Energy. 4 Energy.Rank 3: Cheap Shot and Shadowstrike have a 25%Gloomblade Backstab, Shadowstrike, and Cheap Shot have a 50% chance to refund 15 Energy. 6 Energy.Rank 4: Cheap Shot and Shadowstrike have a 25%Gloomblade Backstab, Shadowstrike, and Cheap Shot have a 50% chance to refund 20 Energy. 8 Energy.Rank 5: Cheap Shot and Shadowstrike have a 25%Gloomblade Backstab, Shadowstrike, and Cheap Shot have a 50% chance to refund 25 Energy. 10 Energy.Rank 6: Cheap Shot and Shadowstrike have a 25%Gloomblade Backstab, Shadowstrike, and Cheap Shot have a 50% chance to refund 30 Energy. 12 Energy.Rank 7: Cheap Shot and Shadowstrike have a 25%Gloomblade Backstab, Shadowstrike, and Cheap Shot have a 50% chance to refund 35 Energy. 14 Energy.Rank 8: Cheap Shot and Shadowstrike have a 25%Gloomblade Backstab, Shadowstrike, and Cheap Shot have a 50% chance to refund 40 Energy. 16 Energy.

Flickering Shadows Activating Sprint and then taking no damage and dealing no damage for three seconds will activate Vanish without triggering its cooldown.Reduces the cooldown of Sprint by 10 sec and Vanish by 30 sec.

Weak Point Increases the critical strike damage of Gloomblade Backstab and Shadowstrike by 5%.8%.Rank 2: Increases the critical strike damage of Gloomblade Backstab and Shadowstrike by 10%.16%.Rank 3: Increases the critical strike damage of Gloomblade Backstab and Shadowstrike by 15%.24%.Rank 4: Increases the critical strike damage of Gloomblade Backstab and Shadowstrike by 20%.32%.Rank 5: Increases the critical strike damage of Gloomblade Backstab and Shadowstrike by 25%.40%.Rank 6: Increases the critical strike damage of Gloomblade Backstab and Shadowstrike by 30%.48%.Rank 7: Increases the critical strike damage of Gloomblade Backstab and Shadowstrike by 35%.56%.Rank 8: Increases the critical strike damage of Gloomblade Backstab and Shadowstrike by 40%.64%.Replaces Etched in Shadow

Second Shuriken Shuriken Storm has a chance per target hit to deal (33.8%100% of Attack power) additional Physical damage to that target.Damage increased by 200%100% while Stealth or Shadow Dance is active.

Shadow Nova After using Shadowstrike or Cheap Shot or using Shuriken Storm while Shadow Dance is active, you explode dealing (150%250% of Attack power) Shadow damage to all nearby enemies.This effect may occur once every 5 sec.

Blizzard Posts

Blizzard

SubtletySubtlety in the long-term it has some room for improvements. For the next patch the first things we're looking at are:

Shadow Dance : Shadow Dances happen a lot more than they used to and in PvE, that's been mostly a welcome change. The rotation is more dynamic than it used to be in previous expansions, with you going in and out of Shadow Dance more often. However, set bonuses, artifact traits, and legendaries frequently grant resources (to any spec) as their bonus (because it's mechanically interesting), and in the case of Subtlety, increased Energy/Combo Points has pushed Shadow Dance uptime to be higher than we think is good for the spec.

Additionally, from both PvE and PvP Subtlety Rogues, we've heard that the spec's feeling of burstiness has been severely reduced, partially as a result of Shadow Dances happening more frequently. We'd like to address this in the next patch with a couple changes. First, Deepening Shadows will be reduced from 3 to 1-1.5 sec of cooldown reduction per Combo Ppoint baseline. Shadow Dance baseline charges reduced from 3 to 2. New talents on the same row that compete against each other will either 1) increase Deepening Shadows back up to the current 3 sec or 2) grant you increased damage during Shadow Dance. This lets you customize your Shadow Dance to happen more often, or be most bursty when it does happen. As usual, we'll retune the damage of the spec alongside these changes, but the first focus should be on changes to pacing and mechanics.

Nightblade : On single-target, Nightblade works okay mechanically as a damage button that you press occasionally, but it doesn't really play as we'd like in AOE situations. The AOE rotation of Shuriken Storm->Nightblade everything isn't what we feel Subtlety should be about, on top of being basically identical to the Assassination AOE rotation. A direction we'd like to go is - Subtlety deals increased damage in AOE by dealing massively increased damage to a single target. In this vein, we're considering a new baseline passive that does something like "Each enemy hit by Shuriken Storm increases the damage of your next Eviscerate by ~25%, up to a max of ~5 stacks", which would push Nightblade completely out of the AOE rotation on 4+ targets.

Separately but related, we don't think Nightblade is a perfect fit for the Subtlety fantasy. On top of being a core rotational damage over time ability on a "get in and get out/bursty" Rogue spec, it's also the passive snare on the spec, which we think could be delivered more simply by re-adding Crippling Poison back to the spec at some point in the future. Tying Subtlety Rogue's snare to a shadow-themed DoT was clearly an attempt at further separating Subtlety vs. Assassination as Shadow vs. Poison, but in hindsight might have been overkill, and it probably wouldn't hurt Subtlety's fantasy that much to have utility poisons back, if we don't find a better fantasy+mechanical alternative for the spec. Don't have concrete long-term plans on this specific subtopic, but it's on our minds.

As an aside on the topic of adding back spells - after doing a lot of class fantasy-focusing and spell pruning in Legion 7.0 (which had many successes as well as failures), we've been adding back some spells to specs (though we do have some strict requirements here) which in hindsight didn't need to be removed. Good examples for Rogue are Blind (which we removed from Assassination) and Shroud of Concealment (which we removed from all Rogue specs), both of which we have since added back. The removal of Blind from Assassination made the spec a little too one-dimensional on the crowd-control front and the removal of Shroud of Concealment cost the class a interesting button that provided rare moments of coolness, without any rotational complexity or huge downsides aside from being an additional button.

Shadowstrike : In the PvE rotation, Shadowstrike coming with a 15 yd teleport is mostly unnecessary, and also sometimes causes usability issues as an uncontrolled teleport on your core rotation. You might be in melee range, and suddenly the boss moves and rotates a bit, and suddenly you Shadowstrike teleport into a spot you don't want to be in.

What we want to do here is add Ambush back to the spec as the replacement in the core rotation for Shadowstrike, and move Shadowstrike to a 30 second cooldown and back up to 25 yd range. Shadowstrike would become the second gap closer for Subtlety, different from Shadowstep in that it's essentially Shadowstep + Ambush in one button. On the table are alternatives like removing Shadowstrike entirely and giving Shadowstep reduced cooldown or 2 charges, but we currently feel Shadowstrike is cool enough of a button and high enough on the usability meter that it deserves a spot on the spec. We'd probably keep the damage, cost, and stealth requirement of Ambush and Shadowstrike identical in all cases to make Shadowstrike's only benefit over Ambush being the teleport.

Honor Talents (4)

Cut to the Chase If nearby enemies within 10 yards move faster than you at any given time, you match their movement speed, and exceed it by 5% for 3 sec.Removed

Honor Among Thieves Critical hits in combat by allies within 15 yards grant you a combo point, but no more often than once every 2 seconds.Now requires Level 6, down from 22Row 4 Col 1 PvP Talent, in place of Turn the Tables

NEW Deals 500% Physical damage, and reduces the target's movement speed by 70% for 4 sec.Cannot be blocked, dodged or parried.

Turn the Tables After coming out of a stun, you deal 15% increased damage for 6 sec.Now requires Level 22, up from 6Row 4 Col 2 PvP Talent, in place of Honor Among Thieves

Blizzard

Sorry for the confusion on this. The intended set of changes was:1) Earth Shock buffed (didn't make into build, still planned)2) Earthquake no longer scales with haste, but buffed to compensate.

Earthquake was double-dipping haste, because its damage per cast scales with haste and Maelstrom generation also scales with haste. That's not necessarily something that always needs an immediate fix, but when it encroaches so heavily on Earth Shock (let alone occasionally surpassing it), that's more of a problem. Trying to pull the two spells apart numerically could have delayed the problem a bit, but even the fact that they're close enough for this is to be an ongoing question is a red flag.

The size of the compensatory buff to Earthquake is open to adjustment if needed, and rigorous feedback on what's a reasonable amount of haste currently used on an "average" Earthquake can help there. It's inevitable that an Earthquake stacked with e.g. Bloodlust and Whispers in the Dark will go down in damage, but an unbuffed one should be able to come up slightly.

Specialization

Crash Lightning Electrocutes all enemies in front of you, dealing 100%150% Nature damage. Hitting 2 or more targets enhances your weapons for 10 sec, causing Stormstrike and Lava Lash to also deal 100%150% Nature damage to all targets in front of you.

Stormbringer Each of your main hand attacks has a 5%Your weapon attacks have a 5.0% chance to reset the remaining cooldown on Stormstrike, and cause your next Stormstrike to cost 50% less Maelstrom and trigger no cooldown.

Ascendance Transform into an Air Ascendant for 15 sec, generating 12 Maelstrom per secondreducing the cooldown and cost of Stormstrike by 80%, and transforming your auto attack and Stormstrike into Wind attacks which bypass armor and have a 30 yd range.

Boulderfist Rockbiter enhances your weapons for 10 sec, increasing all damage you deal by 5%.Rockbiter's recharge time is reduced by 15% and it deals 20% increased damage.Now requires Level 100, up from 15

Crashing Storm Crash Lightning also electrifies the ground, leaving an electrical field behind which damages enemies within it for * (16% of Attack power)] Nature damage over 6 sec.

Earthen Spike Summons an Earthen Spike under an enemy, dealing (1100%1375% of Attack power) Physical damage and increasing Physical and Nature damage you deal to the target by 15%30% for 10 sec.Effect #1 School Damage Value: 0 (AP mod: 1113.75)

Fury of Air Creates a vortex of wind 8 yards around you, dealing (35%46% of Attack power) Nature damage every 1 sec to enemies caught in the storm, and slowing them by 30% for 3 sec.

Hailstorm Frostbrand now also enhances your weapon's damage, causing each of your weapon attacks to also deal 27%30% Frost damage.

Hot Hand Melee attacks with Flametongue active have a chance to make your next Lava Lash cost no Maelstrom and deal 100% increased damage.Procs per minute changed from 3.5 to 2.5Landslide Rockbiter now also enhances your weapon, increasing your Agility by 8% for 10 sec.Now requires Level 15, down from 100Tier 1 Talent, in place of BoulderfistTempest Stormbringer now affects the next 2 Stormstrikes.Stormbringer increases the critical strike chance of your next Stormstrike by 40%.

Ethereal Form You turn ethereal, making you immune to all physical damage, but unable to attack or cast spells and your movement speed is reduced by 50%. Lasts for 15 sec.Use Ethereal Form again to shift out.

Blizzard

The flat buff to the spec's damage to account for the talent changes is a very rough number on current PTR. As always, total DPS tuning gets its closest look at the end of the process, but we often put in some loose compensation for changes along the way to keep things in the ballpark (which facilitates testing/feedback).

The same is true for the new talents, which haven't had much of any look at tuning. New Tempest may well be a little low--that said, possibly reducing the power of that row and buffing the baseline spec instead would be worthwhile, since part of the point was reducing the importance of Stormbringer procs. New Boulderfist is mostly tuned based on pacing--it's a talent that makes the rotation quite full and a little more hectic in terms of GCDs. If its DPS value is too low, it will probably have some sort of damage bonus added.

Both new Tempest and new Boulderfist intentionally are relatively simple passive talents. This is because the overall potential rotational complexity added in the Enhancement tree is rather high (also because they are replacing effects that were quite passive in the first place--old Tempest, and Boulderfist's 100% uptime damage bonus).

The overall goal is somewhat surgically fixing a few core rotational problems that affect nearly all players of the spec, without opening up a huge number of changes or causing much disruption. Longer-term, I wouldn't be surprised to see iteration on ideas like Stormlash, but there's not a specific plan yet, and this patch isn't the right time for it. Of course we will try to adjust isolated talent/trait balancing issues as we can, especially ones that have gameplay impact (for example, I believe there was a good comment somewhere in these threads, that Wind Strikes contributes to the chain-proccing feel of Stormbringer because of its huge short-duration boost).

Blizzard

We talked about it more and decided to let Stormstrike and Windstrike offhand attacks proc Stormbringer for now.

The thinking above is still true, and something we want to keep an eye on, but the changes already in place mean the numbers are quite different from the 7.0 version. In 7.0, if you had e.g. a 10% chance to proc from Stormstrike (main hand only), and 0% from Lava Lash and Boulderfist (and the procs were worth double due to Tempest), there was a huge swing in proc chance between using 3 Stormstrikes and using 3 other buttons. In 7.2.5, you may have 8% from the Lava Lash and Rockbiter, and 16% from the Stormstrike, and the a proc causes you to replace 2 other buttons with 2 Stormstrikes. The swing is much smaller now.

Because the 7.2.5 changes would already reduce the streakiness of Stormbringer procs (and because allowing offhands to proc is slightly more consistent with the tooltips), we'll let that play out on live and inform whether we need to make future changes to mitigate that streakiness further.

Purifying Waters healing reduced by 40%.The Healing Surge cast by Swelling Waves now heals for half its regular amount.EnhancementGathering Storms no longer counts pets and guardians in PvP situations when increasing the damage of your next Stormstrike. Restoration Template Critical Strike increased from 50% to 120%.Template Versatility increased from 130 to 140%.Earth Shield will now heal when an attacker takes 4% of their max health in damage (was 8%).Earth Shield now has 4 charges (was 3).Healing Stream Totem now heals for an additional 40% in PvP situations (was 10%).Riptide heals for an additional 30% in PvP situations.Healing Wave heals for an additional 50% in PvP situations (was an additional 100%).

Spells

Bloodlust Increases Haste by 30% for all party and raid members for 40 sec.Allies receiving this effect will become Sated and unable to benefit from Bloodlust or Time Warp again for 10 min.Cost changed from None to 21.5% of base mana

Spectral Recovery While in Ghost Wolf, you heal 3% health every 2 sec.Increases the movement speed of Ghost Wolf by an additional 10%.

Skyfury Totem Summons a Fire Totem with 5 health at the feet of the caster for 15 sec that increases the critical effect of damage and healing spells of all nearby allies within 40 yards by 30%20% for 15 sec.Cooldown changed from 45 sec cooldown to 40 sec cooldown

Seed of Corruption Embeds a demon seed in the enemy target that will explode after 18 sec, dealing (215%172% of Spell power) Shadow damage to all enemies within 10 yards and applying Corruption to them.The seed will detonate early if the target is hit by other detonations, or takes (Spell power * 300 / 100) damage from your spells.

Phantom Singularity Places a phantom singularity above the target, which consumes the life of all enemies within 2515 yards, dealing 173.9%180% of Spell power)] damage over 16 sec, healing you for 30%20% of the damage done.Now requires Level 60, down from 100Cooldown changed from 1 min cooldown to 40 sec cooldownTier 4 Talent, in place of Siphon LifeSiphon Life Siphons the target's life essence, dealing 0 damage over 15 sec and healing you for 100%60% of the damage it deals.done.Now requires Level 100, up from 60Tier 7 Talent, in place of Phantom SingularitySoul Effigy Creates a Soul Effigy bound to the target, which is attackable only by you. 35% of all damage taken by the Effigy is duplicated on the original target. Limit 1. Lasts 10 min.Removed, replaced with Death's EmbraceWrithe in Agony Agony's damage may now ramp up twice as high.to 15 stacks.

Endless Affliction Increases the duration of Unstable Affliction by 3 sec.Your Unstable Affliction deals the same damage as normal, but its duration is increased by 6 sec.

NEW Increases the range of your Demonic Gateway by 20 yards, and reduces the cast time by 30%. Reduces the time between how often players can take your Demonic Gateway by 30 sec.New level 10 Honor Talent

NEW Corruption damage has a chance to reduce the cast time of your next Seed of Corruption by 100%.New level 43 Honor Talent

Blizzard Posts

Blizzard

Hi Affliction Warlocks. Thanks for the posts and feedback so far. I'd like to talk a bit about the change to Malefic Grasp. In general, we agree that communication is warranted since we changed/nerfed a widely taken talent.

Malefic Grasp is very powerful on live. With the current state of Affliction, the talent is taken on virtually every situation in Nighthold, from single-target to sustained multi-target boss fights. There are things about Affliction that we're not entirely happy with, many of which the community has echoed, and the current feel of Affliction being a single-target spec that focuses its damage into one target rather than spreads its damage out over many targets more evenly, is generally one of them. Malefic Grasp at a high tuning value is a heavy contributor to that. It's not ideal that even on a sustained multi-target fight right now, Malefic Grasp wins out over Writhe in Agony on the same row, when at first glance Writhe in Agony looks like it should be the go-to talent for sustained multi-target since its benefit scales up uniformly per additional target whereas Malefic Grasp reads as a single-target talent.

Separately, we want to allow Haunt to be a viable Soul Shard spender talent. We've heard this from players and also want a Soul Shard spender other than Unstable Affliction in single-target situations. Ways to make Haunt as a Soul Shard spender competitive with a Malefic Grasp at the live value of 70% include dramatically increasing its instant nuke damage, drastically increasing its damage bonus %, or reducing its cooldown further – none of which would feel right on Affliction for a variety of reasons.

Lastly, Affliction's first talent tier is a really high-power talent tier compared to most talent tiers we have, with Malefic Grasp being over a 20% DPS increase as a single talent. Generally, we aim for talent tiers to be more in the 5-10% range. Very high values can both have distortive effects on the spec and make it hard to balance other talents on the same tier.

That all said, in the next PTR patch, changes you should see are:

All Affliction damage done increased by 15%

Malefic Grasp will go down to a +25% damage increase (down from +70% on live)

Writhe in Agony will be reduced to increase Agony's max stacks by +5 (down from +10 on live)

Based on our numbers, 1) this 15% damage buff negates the 70%->25% reduction to Malefic Grasp, coming out as neutral change DPS-wise for Affliction Warlocks using Malefic Grasp going from 7.2->7.2.5 and 2) brings the relative balance of the Level 15 talent tier much closer to each other. As usual, the numbers may change during PTR according to further playtesting and feedback.

As a footnote, the most recent PTR patch with the current reduction to Malefic Grasp from 70%->40% that came with no other explanation or indication that further changes (compensatory buffs to the baseline spec, further relevant talent adjustments) were coming wasn't ideal and we'll try to be more mindful of that in future PTR cycles.We hear you all on Soul Effigy. We're going to remove it in the next PTR patch. It's concerning when the community sentiment towards a talent isn't that it's overpowered or underpowered, but that everyone is terrified they're going to have to play that way if it becomes strong.

It should be understandable how the original concept of Soul Effigy would seem fun in theory, despite it clearly not working out in practice. As an Affliction Warlock, I'm very happy to walk into a 2-target boss fight. At a basic level, you know you're going to get double value out of your DoTs. Walking into a 1-target fight with Soul Effigy just doesn't feel nearly the same. Mechanically, the gameplay of the two situations is very similar, but in the end Soul Effigy doesn't play out well. Could be any of a number of actors - the reduced damage transfer, feeling like the effigy is just there for increased soul shard generation, the usability issues, or the unnaturalness of it as a concept.

Anyways, it's gone. Replacement talent to come.Thanks for the comment Seph, can you clarify whether Affliction will be receiving the nerf to Soul Conduit or not? The notes said only demo was excluded from the SC nerf however on PTR the talent remains 20% for Aff (the tooltip at least, I have not tested the actual %).

Soul Conduit should be unchanged for Affliction. Latest patch notes should reflect that.

This is also further compounded by our current T20 set bonus, which puts a lot of emphasis on drain damage and complete drains - both of which are part of the MG play style, which was just effectively neutered.

The Tier 20 set bonus for Affliction is changing soon. It won't be so focused on Drain Soul.

Specialization

Hand of Gul'dan Calls down a demonic meteor full of Wild Imps which burst forth to attack the target for 12 sec.Deals up to 43.2%120% of Spell power)] Shadowflame damage on impact to all enemies within 8 yds of the targetHand of Doom applies Doom to each target and summons up to 4 Wild Imps, based on Soul Shards consumed.

Honor Talents

Call Observer Summons a demonic Observer to keep a watchful eye over the area for 20 sec.Anytime an enemy within 20 yards casts a harmful magical spell, the Observer will instantly deal 5% of the target's total health in Shadow damage.Range changed from 40 yd range to Melee Range

Conflagrate Triggers an explosion on the target, dealing (226.551% of Spell power) Fire damage.BackdraftReduces the cast time of Incinerate and Chaos Bolt your next two Incinerates or Chaos Bolts by 30% for 10 secGenerates 1 Soul Shard5 Soul Shard Fragments.

Eradication Chaos Bolt increases the damage you deal to the target by 12% for 6 sec.15% for 7 sec.

Havoc now lasts 20 sec, and has no cooldown.Reduce the cooldown of Havoc / Bane of Havoc by 20 sec.

Honor Talents

Bane of Havoc Curses the ground with a demonic bane, causing all of your single target spells to also strike targets marked with the bane. Lasts 10 sec.45 sec cooldown

Entrenched in Flame ShadowburnShadowburnConflagrate roots targetsthe enemy target for 3 sec. This effect does not break from damage.

Fel Fissure Chaos Bolt creates a 5 yardyd wide eruption of Felfire under the target, reducing movement speed by 50% and reducing all healing received by 50% on all enemies within the fissure. Lasts 6 sec.

Blizzard

As we've mentioned before, we're making a number of changes to the resource model for Destruction Warlocks in the next patch. The goal is to create smoother, more granular, less random Soul Shard generation and make Chaos Bolt casts feel more impactful.

First, for Destruction Warlocks, Soul Shards are being split into parts of 10 , which we're currently calling Soul Shard Fragments. Mechanically, this will be similar to the Mists of Pandaria resource system of Soul Shards, except we want to go with a consistent Soul Shard visual, updated Soul Shard UI (work in progress), and name for the resource across all 3 Warlock specs. Some relevant spell changes:

The net result of these changes is that every baseline rotational damage spell will contribute to Soul Shard generation, pushing your resource forward at a steady pace.

Second, Soul Shard generation/refund rate is being reduced overall , mainly for the single-target rotation. However, this is coupled with major damage increases to both Soul Shard spenders - Chaos Bolt and Rain of Fire. Combined, this means that Chaos Bolts will be cast less frequently, but they will hit much harder:

For the AOE rotation, Fire and Brimstone (talent) will cause Incinerate to generate Soul Shard Fragments per target hit, which would largely push Immolate out of the AOE rotation with enough targets. Alternately, if you want to go down the route of maintaining Immolate on all targets in a clumped AOE situation, Cataclysm (talent) will have reduced cooldown (30 sec) and slightly reduced cast time, making it easier for you to do so.

As usual, everything discussed here will continue to be iterated on during 7.2.5 PTR and may change based on further playtesting and feedback.Any chance you can tell us whats happening with ?

It's probably holding destro back more than almost anything else. It has way too much power in it.

We generally agree with this.

In 7.2.5, will no longer remove the cooldown of Havoc - it will only increase Havoc's duration to 20 sec. Havoc baseline will have a 10 sec duration, 45 sec cooldown (subject to tuning).

Havoc's cooldown has gradually crept down over the years, resulting in very high uptime, and culminating in 100% uptime via . This has made Havoc a pretty forgettable button in a multi-target situation. You take , apply Havoc once every 20 seconds, then go about your single-target rotation as usual. Instead of being an important actual cooldown that you planned your casts around, it became a button you always had to just apply first, in order to start doing your rotation.

With Havoc not having 100% uptime, gameplay-wise Destruction will care more about when you generate Soul Shards, how you bank them, and how you prepare to spend them with Havoc coming off cooldown. Additionally, with Chaos Bolt casts becoming relatively rarer but dealing more damage, those times when you do have Havoc available will be even more meaningful.

Despite these changes to Havoc, I want to state that we still want Destruction to stay among the top several 2-target specs. Destruction has a clear niche of being great at 2-targets, especially 2-target spread out (which some specs can't handle as well) and we don't intend to disrupt that.

NEW Soul Shards are generated by some of your spells and consumed to cast your most powerful spells and summon demon to serve you.

While out of combat you regenerate up to 3 Soul Shards.

Talents

Soul HarvestAffliction:Increases your damage and your pets' damage by 20%. Lasts 1512 sec, increased by 24 sec for each target afflicted by your Agony up to a maximum of 35 sec.36 sec.Demonology:Increases your damage and your pets' damage by 20%. Lasts 1512 sec, increased by 24 sec for each target afflicted by your Doom up to a maximum of 35 sec.36 sec.Destruction:Increases your damage and your pets' damage by 20%. Lasts 1512 sec, increased by 24 sec for each target afflicted by your Immolate up to a maximum of 35 sec.36 sec.

Glyphs

NEW As a Destruction Warlock your Soul Shards can be encased in burning embers that float above your head.

Mastery: Colossal Might Increases the damage of your Colossus Smash by 16%13%, and causes it to increase damage you deal to the target by an additional 16%13%.

Colossus Smash Smashes the enemy's armor, dealing 202%222% Physical damage, and increasing damage you deal to them by 15% for 8 sec.Cooldown changed from 30 sec cooldown to 20 sec cooldownExecute Attempts to finish off a foe, causing 162%202% Physical damage, and consuming up to 10 additional Rage to deal up to (162%202% * 10 / 10) additional damage. Only usable on enemies that have less than 20% health. If your foe survives, 30% of the Rage spent is refunded.

Deadly Calm Battle Cry also reduces the Rage cost of your abilities by 100%75% for the duration.

Fervor of Battle Whirlwind deals 45%80% increased damage to your primary target. Now requires Level 75, up from 45Tier 5 Talent, in place of

Focused Rage Focus your rage on your next Mortal Strike, increasing its damage by 30%, stacking up to 3 times. Unaffected by the global cooldown.Cost changed from 15 Rage to 20 RageNow requires Level 90, up from 75Tier 6 Talent, in place of Titanic Might

Mortal Strike refunds 30 Rage when used against targets that are below 20% health. Colossus Smash grants you 10% Haste for 8 sec.Tier 6 Talent, in place of Trauma

Opportunity Strikes Your melee abilities have up to a 60% chance, based on the target's missing health, to trigger an extra attack that deals 160% Physical damage and generates 5 Rage.. Not triggered by Pummel or Heroic Leap.

Overpower Overpowers the enemy, causing 375% Physical damage. Cannot be blocked, dodged or parried, and has a 60% increased chance to critically strike.All your melee attacksYour other melee abilities have a chance to activate Overpower.Cost changed from 10 Rage to None

Ravager Throws a whirling weapon at the target location that inflicts damage to all enemies within 8 yards over 7 sec. Generates 7 Rage each time it deals damage.

Titanic Might Increases the duration of Colossus Smash by 16 sec.8 sec, and reduces its cooldown by 8 sec.Now requires Level 75, down from 90Tier 5 Talent, in place of Focused Rage

Trauma Slam and Whirlwind, Whirlwind, and Execute now cause the target to bleed for 25%20% additional damage over 6 sec. Multiple uses accumulate increased damage.Now requires Level 45, down from 90Tier 3 Talent, in place of Fervor of Battle

Duel You challenge the target to a duel. While challenged, all damage you and the target deal to all targets other than each other is reduced by 50%. Lasts 86 sec.Cooldown changed from 25 sec cooldown to 1 min cooldown

Oathblood Bloodthirst has a 10%15% chance to trigger a second Bloodthirst.

Specialization

Fight through the pain, ignoring 90% of the next up to 18.622.3) * Attack power * (1 + Versatility)] damage you take from any sources, based on Rage spent.

Revenge Swing in a wide arc, dealing (400%350% of Attack power) damage to all enemies in front of you.Your successful dodges and parries cause your next Revenge to become free.Effect #1 School Damage Value: 1 (AP mod: 43.5)

Spell Reflection Raise your shield, reflecting spells cast on you and reducing magical damage you take by 30%. Lasts 5 sec or until a spell is reflected.Cooldown changed from 25 sec cooldown to 25 sec rechargeCharges changed from None to 1 Charges

Talents

Indomitable Increases your maximum health by 25%20%, and the maximum effect of Ignore Pain by 25%20%.

Honor Talents

Mass Spell Reflection Reflects all spells cast on you and on all party and raid members within 20 yards, and reduces magical damage taken by 30% for 3 sec.

Dragon Charge Run at high speed at a distance in front of you. All enemies in your path will take (75000350% of Attack power) Physical damage and be knocked back.

Comments

Comment by JakeXR

on 2017-05-12T12:34:05-05:00

I am actually not looking forward to this patch in the slightest, because if the time-table is to be believed, sometime in June, then that is still too soon for the dramatic changes that they are trying to do.Basically, it just feels rushed.

Comment by Sherokiel

on 2017-05-12T12:38:18-05:00

They just F*ck affliction warlocks xD thx blizzard

Comment by Kreatif

on 2017-05-12T12:53:25-05:00

Don't like these affliction changes at all..

Comment by Gerya

on 2017-05-12T12:59:18-05:00

The BM section is outdated, the mentioned cooldown reduction mechanic was scrapped and the old reset put back in place.

Comment by perculia

on 2017-05-12T13:04:28-05:00

The BM section is outdated, the mentioned cooldown reduction mechanic was scrapped and the old reset put back in place.

Just to clarify, this was about the inclusion of a blue post, not the actual spell section? I've added a note that it was discussed but not currently implemented.

Edit: added this post for more context, as well as a follow-up Discipline post.

Comment by THEBuzzard

on 2017-05-12T13:05:17-05:00

Well... Don't know if I should be happy or sad that nothing changes for blood.

Comment by Garnzel

on 2017-05-12T14:01:25-05:00

This doesn't show the 10% damage increase to Death Strike that was in the first build. Was that removed?

Comment by neoslayyer

on 2017-05-12T14:07:31-05:00

I just can not believe the changes to Laws of Thunder, PAck Leader and Thunderslash. Those are DRASTIC changes and leave me wondering WTH i even cared about putting points in them in the first place. Another thing i see, Enhancement Shaman, REALLY? I see these shaman already pulling packs of 10-15 mobs and mowing them down like they have 20HP, while im sitting there as BM at the same Ilvl having to actually use the dang helm and feign death to heal if i pull 10 mobs(mostly by mistake because of the insane spawn rate of imps and other mobs) on the "dead" Broken Shore. WTH did i buy another overpriced token i will never know. I mean Kill Command looks all messed up to boot.

Welp i will be putting even more miles on the motorcycle as i see it.

Comment by perculia

on 2017-05-12T15:07:49-05:00

This doesn't show the 10% damage increase to Death Strike that was in the first build. Was that removed?

Added, sorry about that.

Comment by Bumz

on 2017-05-12T15:53:21-05:00

So essentially Balance Druids lost their 4% dmg modifier aura and got a ~4% dmg increase to the individual skills? That's a pretty elaborate way of not changing anything.

EDIT: Do like the Starsurge buff (which I assume is meant to compensate for the loss of T19 4set). No more empowerment stacking though?

Comment by Dawnrider

on 2017-05-12T16:01:20-05:00

How about just removing weapons from Monks all together and increase the ap scaling? The whole point of the creation of monks was learning to fight without weapons anyways. "Yay we beat the mogu. Ok start handing out the weapons we learned to fight without."

Comment by EvielthinStealth

on 2017-05-12T17:27:51-05:00

The brewmaster build mentioned is from 2 builds ago I believe. Current build has breath of fire cd back to where it should be, and Blackout Strike cd at 3 seconds not reduced by haste.

Comment by Stormeey

on 2017-05-12T17:40:17-05:00

why why why the huge nerfs to BM ? its incomprehensible

Comment by banshey

on 2017-05-12T19:28:20-05:00

Do u really have any idea what you are talking about?

Comment by Corveroth

on 2017-05-12T20:15:13-05:00

So essentially Balance Druids lost their 4% dmg modifier aura and got a ~4% dmg increase to the individual skills? That's a pretty elaborate way of not changing anything.

I think what we're seeing here is them taking the hotfixed buffs from earlier in the expansion and rolling them into the baseline.

Comment by perculia

on 2017-05-12T20:52:37-05:00

So essentially Balance Druids lost their 4% dmg modifier aura and got a ~4% dmg increase to the individual skills? That's a pretty elaborate way of not changing anything.

I think what we're seeing here is them taking the hotfixed buffs from earlier in the expansion and rolling them into the baseline.

Yep, still worth showing if people are using the old 7.1.5 or 7.2 notes for reference (or Blizzard makes a useful change/addition to one aura).

Comment by hotaru251

on 2017-05-12T21:45:48-05:00

so...Bears getting shafted vs any spell heavy fight.

Aff can do mroe dmg....but lacks shard generation.

Destro gets shafted by big CB's, but the rate u gain shadrs is a joke..

oh AND Blizz finally changed their mastery....shouldnt of taken 10 months to realize it needed an actual constant bonus :|

Comment by NicKris12

on 2017-05-12T22:11:10-05:00

So that means Outlaw got a 30% dmg buff?

Comment by JakeXR

on 2017-05-12T23:15:14-05:00

so...Bears getting shafted vs any spell heavy fight.

Basically yeah, but their reasoning is "frenzied regen and such should be enough". Are you kidding me? They should have just made Mark of Ursol do 15% instead of 30% or something else, but the heavy-handed approach is their signature move.

Comment by GiftedMonster

on 2017-05-13T04:12:45-05:00

So.

They're taking a giant nail-studded bat to the sphincters of Marksmanship hunters. Well, I suppose it is par for the course.

Vulnerability down to a baseline of 30% instead of 100%...so that's 70% damage loss right out the gate. Rank 8 of Unerring Arrows is now...24% instead of 80%. So that's another 56% damage lost.

Blizz, listen. If you're trying to stop people from enjoying marksmanship, just say it. We can handle it, just stop giving us these sack-taps until we quit and you remain free and clear.

I mean, first you crucified us in the Vulnerability department with it now being a slowly-ramping thing that is reset with each and every marked shot and a damage loss, then you shaft Patient Sniper...

Just give it to us straight. You clearly hate Marksmanship hunters because it takes skill and you lack it.